Dreadful post coitum in the backstage of power (2)

Dominique Strauss-Kahn VS. Nafissatou Diallo: A case of Comparative Law

A media event on the threshold of the American Criminal Procedure

A brilliant career, stunning accusation · © CNN

Reality is a hard nut to crack.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn is a major figure who has friends who may be sincere in their affection, no matter how often crossbred with ulterior political motives. Whenever a person is accused of something incredibly serious, his relatives have the natural reflex to refuse to believe that it is just possible.

The first instinct is to protect, to rush to help, sometimes awkwardly, like that wife who thought helping her husband accused of robbery and who found nothing better to say at the bar of the criminal court: « Murderer maybe, but a thief, surely not! »

Clumsy reactions, not to say completely ill-advised have been held. Most of those who did so have retracted or expressed their regrets by realizing the nonsense of their arguments.

It is not herein about demonstrating the guilt or innocence of the IMF’s managing director. No more than trying to prove a hypothetical plot, in one way or another, but to describe and explain the criminal proceedings which he is subject to understand what is happening and what will happen. Note that I do not pretend to be a lawyer practicing in New York and I beg more eminent experts than me to forgive my probable errors and approximations, and I will correct the post if required.

The U.S. procedure, a much more balanced system than the French feedback might suggest.
Let us briefly recall the facts: DSK is charged of having appeared suddenly naked, facing a maid who had entered the room thinking it was cleared out, to put it back in order. After closing and locking the door, DSK would have intended to force her for oral sex, he would have tried to take off her clothes in order to go further, but she managed to escape. The police arrived, reportedly found that he had left the scene, forgetting one of his (seven) mobile phones, and tracked him down in the list of passengers on an Air France flight to Paris.

He was arrested onboard by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey – the local Border Police – and delivered to the NYPD, the Special Victims Unit to be precise.

In the United States like in England, police have broad powers of inquiry and initiative in investigations. Unlike France, where the prosecutor leads the investigation and gives instructions to the police – which are in fact orders –, the district attorney discovers the records when the police bring them together with the suspect. For some serious cases, police officers may have an advisory role, stating the evidence that the DA needs to go further on prosecution. Both authorities are more separated in the U.S. than in France.

The arrest may take place without an arrest warrant in two cases: the crime takes place in the presence of the police officer or if the officer has sufficient evidence to arrest the person (sufficient grounds). In general, a home arrest requires a judge to issue an arrest warrant.

The first stage is booking and it is held at the police station. Fingerprinting, photo identification, judicial collect of criminal record (in New York it is called NYSID report or rap sheet. The person under suspicion may be questioned but he has the right to remain silent (which will never be retained for the prosecution against him unlike in French law). He may be assisted by a lawyer who has the right to intervene during interrogations (the Paris prosecutor shivers in terror at this perspective). The police officer in charge of the case (usually the first on scene) prepares a report – the criminal complaint— which is the basis for prosecution.

Less serious facts give rise quickly to release from custody with straight summons by the judge (Desk Appearance Ticket, DAT). Here we are facing a felony – on top of the scale of gravity, not DAT, but submission to a judge. This arrest should be as brief as possible. The law provides for a period of 48 hours in case of arrest a weekend away, but this rule does not apply in NYC, where hearings are held 365 days a year (from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m.). In this matter, DSK agreed that such hearing which could take place on Sunday – as ‘New York city’s justice doesn’t sleep’— might be postponed to allow achieving DNA testing.

Once the booking is completed, the suspect is escorted to the Court Building, the competent court (here, in the case of felonies, the New York City Criminal Court, but only for the preliminary phase). It was there that DSK was featured on May 16: his memorable walking out under the flashes, that most French journalists published by asking if they could do it, and his transfer from police station to Criminal Court.

There, the police officer handling the case – and/or the complainant – is received by a substitute (Deputy District Attorney, DDA) who decides whether to prosecute or not. The DDA does NOT speak to the suspect, since in the United States, they have realized quite a long time ago that he is the opposing party (in France, there is hope it finally occurs all along the XXII century). If DDA considers the record substantial, he should formalize a ‘written complaint’, i.e. the official complaint of public prosecution.

The suspect is then brought before a judge for a hearing called the arraignment. The judge notifies the suspect of charges against him (a copy is delivered to him), of his right to counsel (he must be assisted, if necessary by a court-appointed lawyer at the arraignment), he is entitled to a preliminary hearing (in the case of a felony as it happens to DSK). He will not be asked at this stage whether he pleads guilty or not guilty, only in cases of misdemeanors and minor offenses, the equivalent in France of ‘délit’ and ‘contravention’ (but the suspect is entitled to give it up and, if need be, to plead guilty before the Criminal Court, this option is already ruled out by DSK’s lawyers).

The judge may decide to immediately stop the proceedings if he believes that the offense is not clearly established (case dismissed, French’s ‘affaire classée’)). With regard to alleged felonies against DSK, the indictment is incumbent on the Grand Jury.

The judge will then decide what happens to DSK until the Grand Jury decides. He can be released on his promise of appear spontaneously (Released on his Own Recognizance, ROR), released on bail or exceptionally remanded –i.e. arrested up to 120 hours until the Grand Jury has ruled or a Preliminary Hearing is held if the suspect, who is now the defendant, asks for it; but the prosecution does not bet on it usually).

The essential difference between Preliminary Hearing and Grand Jury is that the former is public and is held in the presence of the defendant while the Grand Jury meets closed-doors in the presence of the sole District Attorney and witnesses brought to testify.

The Grand Jury is composed of 23 people (a quorum of 16 people is required for it to decide). It outlines the evidences gathered and deliberates and it either votes a true bill – 12 jurors at least consider that there is prima facie, and then the case goes to trial (indictment) – or a no bill – i.e. no trial, then the case is dismissed.

In case of indictment by the Grand Jury, a new arraignment hearing is held before the Superior Court competent to try crimes (felonies), here the New York Supreme Court. Thus began the preparatory stage: the parties may negotiate a plea bargaining, ie, a guilty plea, where they have 45 days to submit petitions (motions) to be settled before the trial, eg to exclude illegally obtained evidence, or direct certain actions. Once these motions considered, a trial date is set. The trial shall be public, and judged by a jury who votes only over the conviction. The penalty, under the sole judge’s domain, is ruled at a subsequent hearing.

Finally there are 3 qualifications retained at this point: criminal sexual act, attempted rape, unlawful imprisonment. The penalty system is somewhat complex. Crimes are divided into categories AI, A-II. B. C, D and E. DSK appears to fall into the category B, so a maximum of 25 years imprisonment and a minimum of 1 to 8 years (Criminal Code of New York State. art. 70).

Dreadful post coitum in the backstage of power (1)

Dominique Strauss-Kahn vs. Nafissatou Diallo: A case of Comparative Law

On the eve of the hearing to be held June 6, throughout Dominique Strauss-Kahn will have to plead guilty or not guilty on the seven charges against him, it seems appropriate to analyze the situation – and report progress – from the perspective of comparative law. To be precise, if DSK pleads guilty, there will be no trial but a conviction to several years in prison, whose number will be negotiated with the judge. If he pleads not guilty – as his lawyers have suggested – a trial will take place.

From crime disguised as vaudeville to presumption of innocence

DSK was the favorite candidate for the French presidential elections of 2012

Falling of an idol. After two breathless weeks of one of the most spectacular cases in French politics, with hearings filmed, suspense, shocking images, conspiracy theories – will this century experience a significant event without its conspiracy theory? – and of course sex – which means outselling–, the excitement will drop, so to speak, and a media relief will be imposed from necessity.

But the jurist loves nothing more than the calm and serenity, which are propitious to reflection.

In hindsight, 15 days later, it is clear that the omnipresence of this case in the timeliness will inevitably recess. « At last! » some masochists might say – the same ones who are sick of this case but who still read this article.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn has been released (but is very closely supervised) and I am delighted, beyond any consideration, of his eventual guilt. Everyone expects to be released until their trial, as detention must be truly exceptional. This is not the case in France. This principle is best applied in the U.S. than in France, especially in criminal cases. Not to mention that before 2000 in the French criminal procedure, before a criminal court, the accused was free until he would necessarily become a prisoner on the eve of the hearing.

The conditions under which this freedom has been granted (a deposit of one million dollars, in addition to a 5 million warranty executed if Dominique Strauss-Kahn does not attend the hearing; prohibition from leaving NYC where he ought to live in a CCTV apartment, an armed guard at the door entrance, waged by the accused himself; a permanent electronic tracer anklet… anything at his expense) have prompted comments on Justice of richest (the accused had to raise $ 6 million and spend about $ 200,000 a month to ensure his own 24-hour monitoring). One thing must be understood.

Though a person who’s well off can probably – and in the U.S. probably more than anywhere else among the democratic countries with an independent judiciary – easily put the necessary resources to ensure his defense and will necessarily be much better defended than a person that may not do so, at this point it was not the New York justice who imposed stringent conditions for releasing DSK. It was the DSK defense who proposed what is called a lease package made of reinforced concrete: the defense came with such a turnkey probation, saying « That’s what we propose.» Basically, the judge just alleged: «Okay, I’m fine with this. » Defense brought out the (very) heavy artillery, for it knew that the prosecutor’s office (District Attorney, DA) would do everything possible to keep this very big fish in the fishpond of Rikers Island. Being elected, the NY prosecutor (in contrast to French judges who are appointed by the President of the Republic on proposal of the Minister of Justice, and the opinion of the Supreme Council of Magistracy; if someone could point it out to some know-it-all, thank you) has everything to gain by showing that he’s severe with the powerful, especially if this powerful is an alien. The prosecutor’s office has pushed to the limits the Polanski precedent: the flight risk (under French law, one talks about « lack of guarantees of representation »), stressing that the accused was arrested on an airplane when he was getting ready to leave the territory. The defense did expect this and anticipated correctly: it showed the ticket purchased before the facts occurred and came up with a proposal that no judge would probably have dared to require since it is costly and burdensome. Add to this the argument that the IMF Managing Director may be considered an honorable man, and the decision has been taken away…

Now begins a period that in French law would be called « pretrial » –understand « making the case ready for trial. » Indeed, U.S. law in general and New York in particular ignores the criminal enquiry conducted by a judge, specific to the Anglo-American inquisitorial system. It is an accusatory system, where the Judge is at a retreat – on a temporary basis – and acts as arbitrator.

A clarification: the Anglo-American accusatory system has never meant that it was on the accused to prove his innocence. It does not preclude the innocentation scheme, but the inquisitorial system, where Justice leads the investigation and keeps the bulk of the initiatives. The systems are not incompatible: in France, civil proceedings are accusatory, while criminal procedure is inquisitorial, with accusatory parties (such as the procedure before the trial chamber). Both parties – and I mean both parties because under U.S. law the complainant is not a party to criminal proceedings – will present their motions to the judge who will decide essentially on the admissibility of an evidence a party wants to produce and which the other does not want to hear about (Let’s say if a DNA test charges the defendant but the chain of custody was broken, meaning that at some point the integrity of the sample was not preserved with certainty -if  the sample has been forgotten in the police officer car at night, so as that could allow its contamination or its replacement- the Judge will exclude this evidence and the prosecution may not fall back on it). They have 45 days to do so. The hearings will be held in the Office of the Judge without publicity so the jury is not aware of these elements. If the DA had fled the information that a DNA test was rejected the defense may request a mistrial, (which is) to consider that the right of the defendant to a fair trial was irreparably damaged and that case should be permanently dismissed. And for those wondering, if it was the defense that was the source of the leak this would allow the DA to make a point of mentioning before the jury. Proceedings are not messy…

To sum up,at the end of the day,  until the trial begins the case will be prepared secretly, without further hearing or videoed suspense. So goodbye, hilarious scenes of special correspondents from the courthouse live from New York, less well informed about what is happening than journalists in Paris who have access to Twitter. I will miss it.

I have heard the optimistic statements of a DSK’s lawyer, Mr. Benjamin Brafman. I must confess my astonishment. Such statements, even cautious are not common in general and it is a first for this lawyer who has now a lot to loose in the event of a guilty plea or of a conviction. I can only speculate that he has a wild card up the sleeve to be so affirmative.

This leads me naturally to the presumption of innocence. In short, it is primarily a rule of evidence (it is up the prosecution to prove the guilt) to which French law added a protection matter of reputation: it is forbidden to make a person being subject of an investigation or prosecution as guilty until he has not been finally convicted. It is not easy (enough), even a lawyer like President Sarkozy cracks up regularly.

Respect for the presumption of innocence is then both a fundamental principle of trial, a pillar of the rule of law – listed by the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, Article 9, since this assumption was far from obvious in 1789 – and a rule limiting freedom of expression.

So to avoid torturing Language, let us clarify concepts so far. Talking about Dominique Strauss-Kahn as a suspect or indicted or accused is entirely correct. Legally speaking, the most accurate perception at this stage is ‘defendant’ since the indictment has been delivered by the Grand Jury. To designate him as « rapist » would undermine the presumption of innocence. But designate him as « alleged rapist » is cumbersome, inelegant and imprecise – as the implicit concept, probably inspired by presumption of innocence, has a sense of « Who is supposed by hypothesis or conjecture. » The opposite of what we mean actually. An alleged rapist is not a presumed innocent.

Where the auditor risks headache is when the victim becomes in turn alleged. Lord! If the rapist is presumed innocent, the victim is an alleged liar? No, of course not, she’s just downgraded to alleged victim category. This makes a lot of suspects, presumed and alleged, isn’t that so?

The French word for « alleged victim » (‘victime présumée’) is « complaining » (‘plaignant’). The concept of « victim » which etymologically refers to the religious as it refers to what is offered in sacrifice to the gods (‘victima’ in Latin) is legally adequate once the crime is established or after conviction. In short, the term victim is inconsistent with presumption of innocence.

This leads me to my second assessment (next week), namely, the French perception of the U.S. procedure –which often forgets the U.S. context and aims to exonerate the alleged abuse of power while forgetting the alleged victim.

The speculators’ ploy and the win-win gambit

Time Magazine lends itself to confusion ceremony ...

The romantic concept of the speculator who may lose or gain from betting does not apply in any case to the current situation. Let us dot the i’s and cross the t’s .

If you consider yourself a speculator because you’re betting that the Inter Milan will win the Champions League on next 22 May, it is up to you. But you may lose money or may worsen it. In this case, no matter you sit well/bad the coach José Mourinho, the actual chances are 50/50 (obviously everything changes if the other team, i.e. Bayern München, has half staff injured, but even so…) Well, this can be applied to any bet in real life. But this is not speculation and, at least, it has nothing to do with the attacks on Greece, Spain, Portugal and – if God cannot help – on Italy. Under present conditions the speculator earns when the market goes up, and he also earns when the market goes down. It’s an everlasting win-win gambit, while the rest of us – you, me or the owner of a company, that’s 99.5% of the world – we lose. So the economy is taking a nose-dive: we are in the hands of Stuka (1) speculators.

To this point, it seems crucial to pull out the smokescreen that let many of us consider that anyone who cooks up a business, who creates and produces a little is a speculator. The word even sounds bad and many associate it with the “parasite” living at the expense of others. But it has nothing to do with it. Speculators are now true professionals, an armed militia who earns when the dollar or the euro go lower, and earns as well when the dollar or the euro are getting higher. One will easily understand that this has nothing to do with the speculator prevailing in the collective imagination. King Arthur’s or Napoleon’s romantic hand-to-hand battles are not still on. Now the attacks are done with drones and occur in Wall Street. Operators do not bet on a particular product, but on a particular result regardless of what happens to the product, which may be a country, your city, your home or your health insurance.

In the U.S., the five largest banks hold assets for 60% of GDP. Government is not even so powerful (bankers who finance elections and war campaigns to both Democrats and Republicans are definitely more powerful). 20 years ago (1990), bank assets accounted for 20% of GDP while 30 years ago (1980), less than 5%. Keep in mind the increasing power of banking for the loans granted. Banks (not governments) are the owners of the world economy. And if the side effect of the crisis led to decreased liquidity, it is logical that banks are now in trouble. That’s why they bet on whole countries as they do with horse racing. With the difference being, in these bets, banks will always win because of benefits offered by the CDS (2).

So do not be surprised if these five banks are who most gain from crisis. At this tempo they will stop being 60% owners to become owners of 100%: the building where you live, the street where you walk. Before long, you will have to cancel these charges to banks, not to governments.

The lords of the photo: Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan and Lawrence Summers who concocted the formula to make that possible. And governments, sheltered by the idea that consumption makes happiness, bought the idea that plunged us into the global chaos we live today. Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy top their list of attacks, and you are part of the 99.5% who did not reap any benefit from it.

Now you know a little about speculators.

__________
(1) Sturzkampfflugzeug, kamikaze, ‘suicidal’, opt in step with your preferred sensitivity.

(2) Credit Default Swap (CDS). The buyer of a credit swap receives credit protection, whereas the seller of the swap guarantees the credit worthiness of the product. By doing this, the risk of default is transferred from the holder of the fixed income security to the seller of the swap. For example, the buyer of a credit swap will be entitled to the par value of the bond by the seller of the swap, should the bond default in its coupon payments.

Garzon, an ‘inconvenient’ judge, now sitting in the dock

It seems that some people do their best to keep the impunity of crime during the Spanish Civil War and the Franco’s dictatorship: the 1977 amnesty law is outdated as it comes into contradiction with the regulatory offence of ‘crimes against humanity’, which is not prescribed under any circumstances – this is one of the principles of universal justice, one of the pillars of universal jurisdiction and a basic principle of comparative law.

The celebrated Spanish magistrate Baltasar Garzon will be judged for trying to dig into the dirty past of Franco’s regime. On receiving complaints by far right-wing organizations, the Spanish Supreme Court has decided to sit the magistrate in the dock for “misfeasance”.

“Aware of his lack of jurisdiction and that the crimes reported lacked penal relevance when the proceedings began, (Garzon) built a contrived argument to justify his control of the proceedings he initiated,” Luciano Varela – an investigating magistrate on the Supreme Court – said in the ruling.

The decision should result in a quick-fix suspension of Baltasar Garzon from the Audiencia Nacional, the Spanish high criminal court in Madrid that centralizes the issues on terrorism, crimes against humanity and organized crime.

Baltasar Garzon, 54, is accused of having set up a “legal subterfuge” to open an investigation regarding the missing persons during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) and general Franco’s regime (1939-1975), ignoring a general amnesty law passed in 1977 by the Spanish Parliament, two years after the death of dictator Francisco Franco. Facing the hard opposition from prosecutor Luciano Varela, Garzon had to abandon the investigation in late 2008.

Considering he had “deliberately ignored” the amnesty law that prevented him to take jurisdiction for the investigation, Luciano Varela refused in early February to close a complaint against Judge Garzon. Garzon’s counsel Gonzalo Martínez-Fresneda, when questioned by the online edition of El Pais, said he would appeal judge Varela’s decision.

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A sad day for Justice
“It’s a sad day for justice,” assured Emilio Silva in the Spanish broadcast corporation. He is the spokesman for the Association for the Recovery of Historical Memory, the leading association of families of victims of Franco. “Relatives from 113 000 missing people cannot find a place for justice to be done anywhere in this country,” said Silva. “If this trial takes place, this will be the first known case of a judge who tries to get the truth, justice and reparation for more than 100 000 people disappeared and finds himself pursued,” declared Esteban Beltran the Spain Director for Amnesty International.

More than two hundred organizations defending human rights and jurists all around the world, including former prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia as for Rwanda, Mrs. Carla del Ponte, recently signed a petition supporting Judge Garzon. They remind that the UN Committee on Human Rights requested Spain in 2008 to revoke the post-Franco amnesty law and “to guarantee the imprescriptibility of crimes against humanity”. “Enforced disappearances” which focused Garzon’s investigation are crimes “that cannot be prescribed or amnestied,” they stated.

Enforced disappearances are among the gravest crimes which cannot be prescribed nor be granted with amnesty without attempting against international law, which is part of the Spanish judicial system.

The crime of illegal detention, without giving information of the detainee’s location, or the crime of enforced disappearances, are crimes of continuous nature, that are ongoing until it is known what happened to the victims; that is why these crimes cannot be object of criminal prescription. When these disappearances have been committed in a systematic, massive and generalized manner, as it occurred during the Civil War and Franco’s dictatorship, they are considered as crimes against humanity and hence cannot be subject of amnesty nor pardon. For this type of crimes, the principle of non-retroactivity in criminal law cannot apply since the prohibition of such crimes already existed under international customary law (jus cogens) at the time of the facts and, the principle of legality, is formed by national provisions and international human rights law.
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An atypical magistrate
As pioneer and advocate of “universal justice”, Judge Garzon had gained worldwide recognition by securing the arrest of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in London in 1998. This atypical magistrate has cornered the armed Basque separatist organization ETA for more than twenty years.

Accused by Spanish conservatives of harboring grudges and seeking the media limelight with his pursuit of high-profile cases, but also as a result of his investigations, Garzon have brought down wrath, both from the very conservative Spanish Judiciary and from the much corrupted Spanish political class (and not only conservatives). If we add the fact that Spanish judiciary is the only non-democratic power in the country with unchanged structures from the dictatorship, now handled by the extreme right… an explosive cocktail is served.

For your information, Judge Garzon is targeted as well by complaints in two other cases: one for the fees he received for lectures in the United States in 2005-2006, the other for his supposed “partiality” in the investigation he has started on the Gürtel corruption scandal that currently splashes the Spanish right .

The Spanish parliament put an end to universal jurisdiction last October 2009 when it approved a bill that narrows the role of the country’s judges in prosecuting crimes committed in other countries.

Sources: Harvard Law Review, Human Rights Quarterly, FIDH, NY Times, Le Monde, El País

Related Posts:

>> The Spanish Law of Universal Jurisdiction, now in Brackets?

>> International lawyers support the Garzon’s cause against Franco’s regime

>> Who Wants Judge Garzon’s Head on a Platter?

>> No todo el monte es orégano (Spanish)

Bank Secrecy: the Key to International Transparency

>> Haga clic aquí para la versión en castellano.

Bank secrecy and tax havens have now become a key factor for international transparency. Their linking to corruption and money-laundering has been uncovered by the financial crisis. This is one of the reasons why developed countries must tackle corruption internationally, a curse that uses secrecy to screen dirty money transfers. In this interactive map you can have a look on the transparency level in 180 countries surveyed and here is the index.

While New Zealand, Denmark and Singapore top the list of the most transparent countries in the world according to this survey of « perception of corruption », Spain lost four places in the ranking (28^th to 32^nd), France gets back from 23^rd to 24^th position, UK move back one place, same as US – demonstrating that the perception of corruption has risen. In the presentation at its headquarters in Berlin, the organization has emphasized the fight against tax havens noting that « there must be no safe haven for corrupt money ». Like every year, countries at war are perceived as the most corrupt, with Afghanistan and Somalia as the worst two.

In Latin America, Venezuela is one of the world’s most corrupt countries, ranking 162, while Chile and Uruguay are located as the least corrupt sharing 25^th place, followed by Costa Rica (43) and Cuba (61). Brazil shares with Colombia and Peru where 75, Mexico shares the 89 with Rwanda and Argentina is 106. China is located in 79^th.

Since 1955, the organization publishes annually an index of perceptions of corruption ranging from a score of ‘10’ for a country perceived as « transparent » to ‘0’ for one seen as « corrupt. » Transparency International does not spare criticism of industrialized countries in a time when governments attempt to revive the economy by injecting a huge mass of public capital on growth aid programs.

The first defendant is bank secrecy « affecting efforts to fight corruption and recover stolen assets”. In that sense, IT downplays its own index, indicating that the problem of banking secrecy concerns « many countries that lead the classification », such as Switzerland in fifth place and Luxembourg on the 14th. So, the report points that

« The money derived from corruption should not be able to find refuge areas. It’s time to end the excuses.»

As for the great revival plans launched by the industrialized countries, Transparency International warns its perverse effects.

« When you spend a lot of public money very quickly and the authorities that control programs are being overwhelmed, the risk of corruption increases. It is a major risk factor », said the president of Transparency in Germany, Sylvia Schenck.

One thing is clear under current circumstances: the existence of tax havens made easier the crisis to strengthen; hence, the obligation to besiege these sources of corruption.

Something smells bad in Wall Street

>>Click here to translate this page to Spanish
>>Click here to translate this page to French

Wall Street thriller goes on…

For some time, something smells bad in Wall Street, and despite the outright rejection that the greed of the system brings about, fraud is still the order of the day.

This time, the offensive from the authorities did not take long to show up when last Friday 16^th October six people were arrested for using illegal inside trading in a financial hedge fund. Among them, investment managers Raj Rajaratnam – a 52 year Sri Lanka billionaire –  and the hedge fund guru Mark Kurland, who handled $ 7,000 million assets. Wall Street thriller goes on.

Along with four more people under arrest, they have been charged with profiting from insider information and manipulating assets that caused more than $ 20 million illegal profits. According to FBI records, this case has emerged as the largest fraud in hedge funds, investment funds that have been targeted since the beginning of the crisis on its no supervision and facilities open to fraudulent transactions.

The dismantling of this organization – orchestrated by Rajaratnam Galleon Group initiator –was made possible through wiretaps performed by the FBI. With this, the research bureau shows that the office gives to these fraud cases the same treatment than fighting drug trafficking and organized crime. Similar to Bernard Madoff, Rajaratnam enjoyed a great protection net due to be an active donor of resources to political parties.

After accusations of inefficiency and delays in monitoring cases like Bernard Madoff, SEC and the FBI have started up operational plans to clean the large image of corruption surrounding the financial sector. Rajaratnam and Kurland’s fall is just one of many to come. Part of the resolution of conflicts that sparked the current crisis, settles into purge the image of the financial sector and eliminate corporate wrongdoing.

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The Political Importance of the Power of Images to Reveal Government Abuse

One of the places where the Iranian uprising against falsified election was given a narrow coverage was China. An attempt was made indeed in PRC to block online images of demonstrations meanwhile official media tried to ignore the clamor.

The reason was clear enough: any mass protest and its brutal suppression raises uncomfortable memories of Tian’anmen Square on the 20th anniversary of China’s nasty crackdown of student movement.
Now China faces itself violent troubles in its Xinjiang western region as Muslim Uighurs confront Han Chinese in what seems to be the worst nation’s ethnic conflict in years. As in Iran, the authorities are trying to repress the protest movement through a combination of technology and force: cutting off cell phone service, blocking the Net, shooting people and sending the riot police.
The Chinese unrest poses an interesting dilemma. What is Iran? An Islamic republic, whose leader aspires to lead the Muslim world, to make of Muslims rising up in an authoritarian state? Islamic commitment requires solidarity with the Uighurs, while repressive solidarity requires pledge with Chinese security forces. The answer in the current Iranian climate has been predictable enough: almost no mention in the official media of the Chinese riots –and no mention that one party is Muslim.

These are both authoritarian states that have generally stopped short of totalitarian control, adapting to the 21st century by limiting freedom and deploying repression where it is critical to the maintenance of the system, but allowing some measure of liberty –to travel, trade, speak out– where it is considered harmless. Call them the new “Red Line” states. Live your lives and make money, they say, but never cross the red lines, which include organizing against the system and denouncing the leadership in place.
These methods have seemed effective but became unsuccessful in recent weeks. The Iranian regime, surprised by a last minute wave of support to the opposition leader, Mir Hussein Mussavi, opted in mid June for a brutal crackdown in defense of an electoral lie. The shift from control to savage repression was abrupt and devastating, pushing many young Iranians from reluctant consent to .total opposition.

Despite this, many young Iranians have borne witness –with mobile video images and photos, through twitter and other shapes of social networking–  and have thus amassed a permanent global act of indictment against the usurpers of mid June 2009. the Neda effect –the image of eyes blanking, life abating and blood blotching across the face of young student Neda– will undermine the regime over time.
China makes no electoral simulation in its one-party system, but it too, has been temporarily undone by the power of word and image spreading across the Internet. The current unrest in the Xinjiang western desert region has its origins in an incident thousands of kilometers away in southern Guangdong province, where a Uighur dormitory was attacked in June by Han Chinese and at least two people were killed.
Photographs appeared online. The government tried and failed to delete them. Calls for protest spread through web sites and instant messaging. Again, the government attempted to block online discussion of the incident. But Uighur rage had gone viral.

By the official count 183 people have now been killed in the protests. As in Iran, images of police officers, confronting weeping women burgeon, carrying emotional charge all through the country and across the world.
Both Iran and PRC have tried to blame people outside the country for the turmoil. They have identified foreign agents they assert are orchestrating troubles. They should look closer to home.

Repression, injustice and brutality have encountered a force hard to control: the empowerment of people through technology. Communication feeds a hunger for freedom that may in the end be stronger than any red line.

Bongo Kicks the Bucket: Calm, Luxury and Consternation

President Omar Bongo of Gabon died  on Monday in a  a hospital in Barcelona, Spain, where he was reportedly being treated for cancer. He was 73.

The man was endowed with a prodigious memory, a real political intelligence and cynicism enough to ensure him the necessary longevity to become a true dictator. He has hold forty-one years.

With Bongo, Gabon turned into a strategic oil emirate for France and a stalwart heavyweight pillar of the “Franceafrique“. So, when crude prices quadrupled in 1973, Omar Bongo converted to both Islam and finance.
Money flowed like water. He had therefore the intelligence to protect the money of unhealthy lusts  by diversifying his investments. That is, putting the money aside, I mean at HIS side.

In 1975, he founded three banks:
* The Bank of Gabon and Luxembourg (BGL) in Libreville
* The International Bank (Siba) in Luxembourg
* The French Intercontinental Bank (Fiba) in Paris, the largest one.

The latter will be THE Bongo’s bank and will be chaired by one of his trusted men, Pierre Houdray, until 2000.

Let us continue…

The Head of State had a personal account and a sub-account in which his stepfather, Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso, had a proxy. Those accounts were fueled by (partly public) ELF French oil company by at least $40 million per year. FIBA served as a nest egg to the clan of Libreville: family, relatives, counselors and so.

This opulence is reflected in the Bongo’s real estate assets. For several years, NGOs Sherpa and Transparency International lead a court battle against the money diversion by African heads of state.They had inventoried these dictators’ “ill-gotten gains”, including their real estate in Ile-de-France (Paris region). The President of Gabon and his family figure prominently.

But the Fiba is also the tank which Omar Bongo draws from to “help” his french political friends. The ritual is immutable: when he stops in Paris, at the  Hotel Meurice, it is compulsoty to seek an audience and get the approval from the boss. A phone call to Pierre Houdray and the case is resolved.

Afterwards, one just need to report to headquarters, (avenue Georges-V in Paris) to take delivery of the grant, in cash. Bongo has actively supported Gircard d’Estaign and Jacques Chirac in the 70s, but François Mitterrand’s election in 1981, as well.

According to the men of Elf, including Andre Tarallo, the “Mr. Africa” of ELF Group, all political parties have benefited from this assistance (you know… France & Gabon, brothers in arms), with the exception of the far right National Front.

During the 90s, the proliferation of laws on the financing of political life, the system becomes more complex. More opaque too, using the resources of many tax havens (Liechtenstein, the Caribbean, Bank of New York …) which earned him the wrath of money laundering committee  from the US Congress.

The engineers of power will also be advised to take care of the ethnic balance within the country. For the time being, his family, including his children Ali and Pascaline (candidates for the succession), stand ready to defend the heritage (there’s a big money involved), even at the cost of a war of succession.

Concerns, as in old families plenty of secrets, are left to heirs. Hence, Pascaline’s Missi Dominici would be better-advised to turn into philosophers. (Ali, Pascaline, you must also be aware of the harassment and intimidation that threaten those Gabonese who dare to oppose the corrupt practices encountered there. You know of course that the massive misappropriations of state revenues contribute towards impoverishing the citizens of Gabon and prevent the emergence of normal democratic institutions.)

And Mr Sarkozy would also be well advised not to forget that “the worries of Gabon are also those of France.” Same old stuff…

A Shout to Nothing

Who cares about the brutal Burmese dictatorship and the slow murder of Aung San Suu Kyi?

Nor did officials give him permission to visit her, even when he was dying of cancer in 1999. For four years they could not speak to each other. He, Michael Aris, was her husband and she met him when they were young students at the University of Oxford. She studied philosophy, and he was a student of Tibetan civilization. They got two children and a life of struggle for freedom in Burma, which lead them to separation when the Burmese dictatorship finally pulled her out from the world. She could see briefly her son, Kim at the airport in Rangoon in 1999. That’s all. For many years she couldn’t get reports on him and since then, she has been unable to see him again.
Daughter of the great hero of the country’s independence, Aung San, who was killed when she was two, her biography is full of acts of great courage, as occurred in the Irrawaddy delta, when she kept on moving towards a platoon who pointed her with a rifle. Also her talks throughout the country, defying the dictatorship ban. Despite the military junta efforts to banish her, she wanted to stay near the people, thus strongly motivated by her Ghandian ideas and her Buddhist moral. “The goodness and justice will not let you escape,” according to her own words. And as a result, this fragile woman, daughter of Burmese heroes, has dedicated her life fighting for her people’s welfare. She has won elections that the tyrant did not recognize; she is house arrested and not being able to go out or talk to anyone outside.
The latest news alert on her delicate physical condition and update us on her imprisonment, along with two women, mother and daughter, who take care of her for years. What for?  She was taken to prison after a U.S. citizen, John William Yettaw, swam a mile across Inya lake to her home and stayed overnight, which violated the terms of her house arrest. She was just six days short of completing her house arrest
She owns of all the awards the world is able to bestow on freedom heroes, as the Thorolf Rafto Prize, the Sakharov Prize and the Nobel Peace Prize. But, beyond the awards, she is suffering the abandon that all fighters bear when they do not fight for causes of interest. Who is concerned by the brutal dictatorship in Burma? Who cares about the thousands of dead and prisoners, the disregard to all basic rights, the slow murder of Aung San Suu Kyi herself, and the slaughter against the Buddhist monks who rebelled in recent months? Who cares of Amnesty International reports, which deals with mass killings of peasants with machetes? Who cares about the rapists hordes, which choose women from minority ethnic groups in prison for their acts of sexual violence? Not even the plundering of international aid by the military junta during the 2004 tsunami, leaving hundreds of thousands of victims to their fate, raised a convincing wave of anger throughout the world.
The so called State Peace and Development Council is today one of the world’s most heinous dictatorships, and their crimes against the people of Myanmar are, unequivocally, crimes against humanity. But?
It is not the first time that someone cries out for such a reasons, as nobody cares writing about it -dixit García Márquez. Not the first time, either, that one makes an unfriendly complaint, once again, perhaps in the futile hope that someone bothers this drumming. It is not true that street banners noise in the world will invigorate the victim’s core reasons. People are mostly mobilized owing to possible culprits’ name. That is, if the problem is Israeli or American, then noise shouts and bursts into anger. Quite the opposite if the problem is called Sudan’s dictator or the Burmese Tatmadaw’s leader, hence, the noise becomes deafening silence.

This happens because banners no longer have international causes, only obsessions. Thanks to this silence, dictatorships as Burmese are unpunished for their crimes. And as a result of this silence, the victims as Aung San Suu Kyi shout to nothing…

Join the global campaign to free Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi at Free Aung San Suu Kyi