Register – The WWF – endorsed by no less a body than the European Space Agency – has stated that economic growth should be abandoned, that citizens of the world’s wealthy nations should prepare for poverty and that all the human race’s energy should be produced as renewable electricity within 38 years from now.Most astonishingly of all, the green hardliners demand that the enormous numbers of wind farms, tidal barriers and solar powerplants required under their plans should somehow be built while at the same time severely rationing supplies of concrete, steel, copper and glass. The WWF presents these demands in its just-issued Living Planet Report for 2012. It’s a remarkable document, not least for the fact that it is formally endorsed for the first time by the European Space Agency (ESA) – an organisation which would cease to exist in any meaningful form if the document’s recommendations were to be carried out. Read Article
PressTV – The cousin of the British Queen, Prince Michael of Kent, has received £320,000 ($514,000) from a Russian ex-politician who fled to London in 2000. Read article
Washington Post – Seems no one is immune from the tender mercies of the TSA pat-down. First, we learned that Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was subjected to a handsy search. And now we learn of the latest high-profile search-ee: former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Yeah, the guy who was once an advisor to presidents, the one who helped negotiate the end to the Vietnam War…and, oh yeah, he’s got a Nobel Peace Prize. Read Article
BBC – Bosses of the UK’s biggest companies earn millions in “excess remuneration”, a report reveals. Pay packages designed to incentivise FTSE 100 chief executives had little effect on company performance, it found. Reckitt Benckiser, ICAP, and BG Group are among the “worst value FTSE 100 companies”, said Zurich-based financial research firm Obermatt. Read Article
Guardian – Lord Mandelson has been recruited to advise a multinational company accused of illegally chopping down endangered rainforest. The Labour peer and his staff in the political consultancy that he set up after leaving government have been meeting officials on behalf of Asia Pulp and Paper. For more than a decade, APP, one of the world’s largest pulp and paper companies, has been accused by environmental groups such as Greenpeace of destroying thousands of hectares of Indonesian rainforest and endangering some of the world’s rarest animals. A growing number of firms have boycotted APP. The disclosure comes as Mandelson and other peers are expected to face pressure from the House of Lords authorities to declare their clients. Read article
BBC – Iraq’s fugitive Vice-President Tariq al-Hashemi has been charged with several murders, including those of six judges, court officials in Baghdad say. Mr Hashemi is not expected to attend his trial, which opens on Thursday. He has taken refuge in the Kurdish north. Read article
DailyMail – The King of Bahrain has given the Queen a political headache by accepting her invitation to attend her Diamond Jubilee lunch at Windsor Castle next month.The decision will anger human rights groups opposed to his bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protesters.As a matter of royal protocol, the Queen was obliged to invite the king, along with other crowned heads from around the world, to her celebratory lunch on May 18, as revealed by The Mail on Sunday three weeks ago. Read article
The widening gap between the rich and non-rich has been evident for years, but pre GFC it was easy to ignore this concentration of wealth among an elite few. Now, however, the gap is all too obvious. The two tier economy is an absolute reality, with the divide between the wealthy and “the rest” getting larger and larger. We are living in times where the rich display outsize political influence, narrowly self-interested motives, and a casual indifference to anyone outside their own rarefied economic bubble.Keep up to date with a look at our Global Elite news archive of 741 articles on the topic CLICK HERE
WesternJournalism – When the Spanish online voting company SCYTL bought the largest vote processing corporation in the United States, it also acquired the means of manufacturing the outcome of the 2012 election. For SOE, the Tampa based corporation purchased by SCYTL in January, supplies the election software which records, counts, and reports the votes of Americans in 26 states–900 total jurisdictions–across the nation. Read article
The Royal Society – Rapid and widespread changes in the world’s human population, coupled with unprecedented levels of consumption present profound challenges to human health and wellbeing, and the natural environment. This report gives an overview of how global population and consumption are linked, and the implications for a finite planet. Read Report
BBC – Influential Japanese politician Ichiro Ozawa has been found not guilty in a funding scandal. Mr Ozawa, dubbed Japan’s “shadow shogun” because of the backroom power he wields, had been accused of violating political fundraising laws. But he had argued it was a technical mistake of which he had been unaware. Read article
BBC – The prime minister had argued that the president, who rejects the corruption charges, has immunity as head of state. The case is part of a stand-off between the government and the judiciary, which many believe is being backed by the military as it pursues the case against the civilian administration. Mr Gilani’s lawyers say he will appeal against his conviction. Read article
AP – A once-mysterious $400,000 check written to a “super” political action committee supporting Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign rekindled a nagging question this election season: Just how much disclosure is enough to satisfy transparency? Read article
Guardian – David Cameron’s father ran a network of offshore investment funds to help build the family fortune that paid for the prime minister’s inheritance, the Guardian can reveal. Though entirely legal, the funds were set up in tax havens such as Panama City and Geneva, and explicitly boasted of their ability to remain outside UK tax jurisdiction. Read article
Radio Netherlands – The Netherlands needs legal provisions to allow compulsory contraception for serious drug addicts, psychiatric patients and the mentally handicapped. That’s the controversial argument being made by Queen Beatrix’s brother-in-law Pieter van Vollenhoven, former head of the Dutch Safety Board.The subject of compulsory contraception is taboo in the Netherlands. But Mr Van Vollenhoven believes that situations regularly occur in which such a far-reaching measure should nevertheless be possible. In an interview with current affairs TV programme Zembla he says: “People will accuse me of going too far. But to be honest, that’s an easy thing to say if you do not know the facts. My eyes have been opened by seeing these problems. They came as a shock. You can see that these parents need help, since they’ve no control over their own lives. When it’s clear that’s the case, perhaps contraception would be the best step.” Read Article
Telegraph – The 74-year-old monarch has faced a barrage of criticism over his extravagant lifestyle at a time when Spaniards are suffering harsh austerity measures in a nation mired in economic crisis. Left wing leaders called for greater transparency of Royal accounts and one even suggested it may be time for the once popular monarch to give up his throne. Read article
Independent – The former British prime minister’s consultancy firm was paid a reported £27million in 2009 to advise Kuwait’s rulers on “political and economic trends and governmental reform.” A number of Kuwaiti MPs are now in the process of gathering information about the appointment, and plan to question the country’s finance minister Mustafa Jassem later this month. Read article
Guardian – Italy’s former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has handed out cash gifts worth more than €100,000 to young women due to testify in his trial on charges of paying an underage prostitute. Berlusconi has reportedly paid €127,000 (£105,000) to three witnesses since his trial began last April. The trial centres on Moroccan runaway Karima el-Mahroug, known as Ruby the Heart Stealer, who attended so-called “bunga bunga” parties at Berlusconi’s mansion outside Milan in 2010. Read article
Washington Post – President Obama is off on Air Force One to attend the Summit of the Americas this weekend in the beautiful seaside city of Cartagena, Colombia.Secretary of State Hillary “The Texter” Clinton will be taking her plane — then heading from there to meetings in Brasilia and Brussels. A couple of House congressional delegations — including a bipartisan group headed by House Foreign Affairs subcommittee chairman Connie Mack (R-Fla.) — are packing to go. Also signed up are Reps. David Rivera (R-Fla.), Albio Sires (D-N.J.), Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.), Henry Cuellar (D-Tex.), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex.) and Sander M. Levin (D-Mich.). Curiously, not many senators seem to be going. In fact, it may be that the only one going from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a possible vice presidential pick, who we’re told is flying commercial to attend. Well, if handled properly, it could also help boost his foreign-policy chops. Reminds us of a foreign jaunt made by another potential vice presidential pick back in 2004. That would be John Edwards , whose criminal trial is set to begin Thursday in Greensboro, N.C. Edwards is charged with violating campaign finance laws related to the payment by two wealthy donors of nearly $1 million to help hide his pregnant mistress while he was running for president. Edwards gave a speech in June 2004 at the Bilderberg conference that was widely credited as one reason John Kerry chose him. Read Article
Reuters – Carlyle Group LP is eyeing a market valuation of $7.5 billion to $8 billion in an initial public offering, as the U.S. private equity firm prepares to kick off a marketing blitz to investors, perhaps as soon as next week, said a source with knowledge of the situation. Read Article
BBC – Moscow has condemned the US prison sentence for arms dealer Viktor Bout as “political” and says the case will be a priority in relations with Washington. Read article
Financial Times – The Rothschild family plans to secure “long-term control” over its international banking empire by merging its French and British assets into a single entity and implementing a new form of governance that provides immunity from hostile takeover. The historic reorganisation will reunite the shareholdings of the French and English sides of the family into a single company, listed in Paris. Read Article
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