July 30, 2003
Headlines – Produced by Randi Zimmerman
President Bush Holds Press Conference
What About Afghanistan?
Hindu Nationalists Shut Down Indian Capital- Miranda Kennedy.
IL Death Penalty Reform- Rita Sand.
Texas Senator’s Hole up in New Mexico (2:15)
Continuing the turmoil in the Texas state legislature over the issue of Congressional redistricting, which last month saw House Democrats take direct action to stop the process by leaving the state and holing up in a Oklahoma motel, yesterday 11 Texas state senators continued the protest by journeying to New Mexico where today they remain in self-imposed exile. From Albuquerque, Joe Gardner Wessely has more.
Montreal WTO Meetings Wrap-Up (4:08)
A mini-Ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization is wrapping up today in Montreal after three days of negotiations at a downtown Montreal hotel, which were met with a series of large street demonstrations organized to oppose the meetings by the Popular Mobilization Against the WTO. There have been 5 days of protests to oppose the two meetings in Montreal and on Sunday, the eve of the WTO mini-ministerial, some 2000 people took to the streets under the banner of No One is Illegal. This as Montreal’s mini-ministerial which was organized in the lead up to Septembers WTO Ministerial meetings to be held in Cancun Mexico, focused on building consensus on key issues to the WTO such as migration and agriculture, central to insuring that September’s meetings do not collapse as did the WTO Ministerial in Seattle in 1999. Stefan Christoff reports from Montreal.
Mistrial in LA Police Beating Case (4:18)
An LA judge declared a mistrial yesterday in the Donovan Jackson beating case. On their fourth day of deliberation jurors said there was no way they could reach a verdict on the officer charged with assault after he punched and slammed a handcuffed African American teenager onto the hood of a squad car. As Jordan Davis from KPFK in LA reports, community leaders blasted the verdict by asking for peaceful protest.
Nigeria Poised to Enter Liberia (4:02)
The Nigerian Senate yesterday gave the ok to President Olusegun Obasanjo to send some 2,000 soldiers to a peace-keeping mission in war-torn Liberia. This as the Senate also endorsed the political asylum granted to Liberian President Charles Taylor by Obasanjo. Meanwhile, fierce fighting between Taylor’s government forces and rebels continues in Liberia. The crisis in the West African country has gone on for almost fifteen years with all manner of human rights abuses committed by desperate warlords, who want to control the country’s resources. Sam Olukoya reports from Lagos.
Digital Voting Machine Flaws (4:42)
Activists and computer experts around the U.S. have become increasingly concerned that the electronic voting machines being phased in may have basic flaws in their design, allowing errors and potentially large-scale fraud. FSRN broadcast a special on the whole issue of voting processes on July 4th called Hacking Democracy, that can be heard by visiting our website, www.fsrn.org. Last week, the voting machine story sparked global interest with the publication of an independent scientific review of the voting software of one company. One of the scientists calls the software “amazingly and astonishingly wrong.” Pokey Anderson brings us the latest.
