I think it is probably foolish to think there weren't others besides My Lai but the VC and NVA would have a few to account for also.
Like all wars the first casualty is truth and the "truth" is told by the Victor.
The Geneva convention like a countries constitution is only useful if it is adhered to by all parties and especially governments. Something that rarely if ever happens.
Now aired:
https://www.aljazeera.com/live/
The Guantanamo 22
How a group of men from China's Uighur community were sold in Afghanistan and imprisoned in Guantanamo as terrorists.
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes...112137598.html
Just airing:
Ocean's Monopoly
How Nations Use Science to Conquer the Sea
A look into the complex world of ocean bed ownership and how nations are vying for their own piece of the puzzle.
What if a country didn't end at the coastline but would simply continue under water? A territory the size of a continent would come up - a territory uncontrolled and open for seizure. But who owns the sea bed, is it territory still to be claimed?
The fact that the world's oceans cover three-quarters of the earth's surface once meant very little to governments around the world. This changed when water exploration teamed with demand for specific resources and the need for power.
Read more:
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes...061706644.html
In these days, beside the reporting from Gaza, now also live from SC of UN, the AlJazeera is broadcasting few documentaries about history of Palestine - Israel conflict, quite interesting information about the role of UK.
https://www.aljazeera.com/live/
Just airing:
Shadow War In The Sahara
The so-called 'war on terror' or fierce competition for natural resources? We examine the increasing US and French military presence in Africa.
Just airing:
The Big Picture
The Big Picture charts the evolution of modern Libya, the legacy of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s rule and the effects of his demise.
https://www.aljazeera.com/live/
The universal War for territory and therefore natural resources access is the looming empire expanding activity of the last generation.
....and forewarned, as numerous critical material has been published in the last couple of decades examining the coming war for resources - which is already present.
Just airing a documentary about Thailand, small people financing (in Thai language), good for your wife...
^It's revisiting of an older "Viewfinder"
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes...337227333.html
Granny Loan Shark
A moneylender in the slums of Bangkok prepares to hand over the family business while dealing with an unreliable client.
As the Thai economy grows, so do the aspirations of the people in this increasingly credit-driven nation.
Yet many of the 100,000 slum dwellers in Bangkok find themselves locked out of conventional financing and reliant on local moneylenders.
Granny believes she is filling the gap by helping her poor neighbours through her money lending business but thinks nothing of rejecting a loan request from Wat when he fails to keep up with interest payments.
With her health and energy failing, Granny deftly unleashes her slum lending acumen and frets about how the future of her business will fare in the hands of her spoilt children.
Filmmaker's view
By Shane Bunnag
The first time I spoke to “Aunty Yai” I must have looked sick because she made me an offer: “If you fainted right now and needed to go to hospital, I could lend you the money right away.”
Yai consistently cast herself as force for good, a micro-financier in a market excluded from regular banking. She was certainly not public spirited but neither was she some kind of demonic usurer. Like the secondary character in the story, Prawat, she displayed varieties of contradiction and human fallibility that I found indicative of larger themes in Thailand and also appealing in a dramatic sense.
In spite of my ethical reservations, I liked Yai. Both Prawat and Yai were extremely easy to work with and I had no trouble getting them to open up on camera.
Yai was not the first lender I came across but definitely the most charismatic and I felt she spoke volumes about the way slums dwellers interacted with each other. Yet Yai remains for me an extremely ambiguous figure.
She could be compassionate and truly grandmotherly and also menacing and brutal. Her lending is exploitative but she insists she is doing her neighbours a favour. She is deeply spiritual but most of the time thinks of nothing but money, breaking almost all of the Buddhist precepts.
While conducting research it became clear that in the complex ecosystem of slum finance there would be fascinating areas I would have to leave out: the illicit gambling networks, reciprocal pawning and the widespread subcontracting of interest collection; instead I opted to explore the relationship between Yai and Prawat, a lender and a borrower, both with dreams of a better, unattainable middle class life.
I did not intend to trivialise or soften what is a very harsh subject: exploitative lending to the poorest and most vulnerable. I felt that a simple human story might offer an emotive glimpse into a closed world without treading the hackneyed slum-life-is-hell theme.
The largest slum in Thailand is in Klongtoey, the old Bangkok port district. Most people know it as the view from the expressway during one of Bangkok’s interminable traffic jams. Although Klongtoey is rife with crime and drugs it is still a diverse and colourful place, with several temples, a church, a mosque and two princely palaces.
I came know Klongtoey a few years ago making another documentary about the community. In this first film I was interested in Klongtoey as an anachronism within the larger modern city.
The practices that made its inhabitants “failures” were all traditionally Thai; people were still living a pre-modern, almost subsistence, lifestyle. The culture, from hairstyles to building techniques and professions were from a vanishing past and now completely marginalised. At certain times of the day Klongtoey felt like a village in the countryside. It seemed that the sense of neighbourly support and cultural continuity held these people together, providing a strong identity and perhaps also a safety net in times of trouble.
Having stated that, I would not over-estimate the strength of communal altruism in the slums. The daily struggle makes people pragmatic. However, the coping mechanisms and mentality of the people I came across were so typically Thai.
Thailand has a mania for self-definition partly because the nation building process is still underway and also because there is a great unease about the future of the country and the transformation of society.
There are dozens of books purporting to define the elusive Thai mindset. I would sum it up as muddling through with gallows humour. Without which it would be hard to survive poverty with no chance of social mobility. So, in the slum microcosm of the nation, Yai and Prawat are embodiments of this Thai soul.
Unlike its neighbours, Thailand does not suffer typhoons, earthquakes, or cyclones. In the modern era it has enjoyed a relatively stable and peaceful history. The Thai slums are not the most miserable, daily wages are not penuriously low. It may be that this limited exceptionalism is what makes Thailand’s story captivating. Life in the kingdom ticks over, increasing affluence slowly trickles down but the idea of the better life and what it might entail is elusive.
Shane Bunnag is a Bangkok-based filmmaker. He was born in Cambridge to a Thai father and an Irish mother and lived in Greece before moving to Thailand in 2005. His first film was a Greek language narrative fiction. Working as an independent director in Bangkok, he has made films on diverse subjects that include the fight against human trafficking in the Golden Triangle, environmental activism and juvenile rehabilitation in the countryside. In 2012, Shane completed a documentary about the fading elephant culture on the Thai-Cambodian border.
Excellent thanks for posting that, bit more to the motor cy mans story I think. Says he earning at least 500 a day but needs to go borrowing, some drink or gambling going on there by the look of it, his mrs looks pissed off with him, but she's 20k in debt for something we did not get told about. Thais are hopeless with money, apart from the Chinks and Indian ones.
For a change, just airing:
Al Jazeera World
Seven years on from Gaddafi’s death, an investigation into how western governments handed over his opponents for detention and torture by Libyan intelligence.
Libya's Muammar Gaddafi, Rendition and the West
Investigating allegations that the UK and US colluded with Gaddafi to hand over his opponents for detention and torture.
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeeraworld/
Interesting stuff, Klondyke. Thanks for posting that up.
It helps bring the Christpher W and John Burdett novels into a clearer light.
Everyone wants to make their family happy. Money is usuay the big divide. Other "diversions" simply add to that divide.
The one thing the narrative doesn't tell us is the amount of interest the borrowers must pay. I've heard it was 5% monthly (60% annually). They're never going to pay off the debt and bottom-feeder Lender Yai holds their house book.
Then again no other finance company or bank is interested.
Bottom line : surely some of the teenage kids leave school to work in Phuket, Patts et al to help pay off the debt. "You handsome man."
Just aired (video available):
Rendition Revisited
Will the Trump administration sanction a return to some of the darkest days of the so-called war on terror?
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/
Now airing:
Shadow World
Shadow World reveals the shocking realities of the global arms trade - a business that counts its profits in billions and its losses in human lives (1/2).
Just airing:
Iraq
The war in Iraq was based on lies. We uncover how world leaders and the American public were duped into a war that cost thousands of lives.
https://www.aljazeera.com/live/
I didn't see this one in previous posts on this thread. Apologies if I missed it.
The Lobby Parts 1-4 on YT...from November 2018
Released by the Electronic IntifadaTo get unprecedented access to the Israel lobby’s inner workings, undercover reporter “Tony” posed as a pro-Israel volunteer in Washington. The resulting film exposes the efforts of Israel and its lobbyists to spy on, smear and intimidate US citizens who support Palestinian human rights, especially BDS– the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.
It shows that Israel’s semi-covert black-ops government agency, the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, is operating this effort in collusion with an extensive network of US-based organizations. These include the Israel on Campus Coalition, The Israel Project and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
Censored by Qatar
The film was suppressed after the government of Qatar came under intense pressure not to release it – ironically from the very same lobby whose influence and antics the film exposes.
https://electronicintifada.net/conte...-you-see/25876
All good points but does not detract from the fact that they have done some great investigative journalism. One on Israeli interference in British politics was good as was the Iraqui war doco. At least when they did the crusades, an arab perspective thats what you got but at least you knew from the title it was going to be biased. Even RT can do some good docos. But all of them lose some credibility and should be treated with caution as per TCs comment.
In fairness the Aus ABC doesnt go out of its' way to criticise the Aus labor party or Greens and can never seem to remove their PC slant from any story to do with the centre, centre right, or far right.
It seems to me most journalists are from the left and the rest from the far right and it's hard to see balanced reporting. That grey bearded pommy DH on France 24 another talentless leftist tit. A sort of Leftist equivalent of Huckaby or B O'reilly until he got caught with his finger in the pussy jar.
Just airing:
Peace And War
An insightful look at the goals and motivations behind Russia's foreign policy as explained by the people who help shape the Kremlin's ideology and policies.
https://www.aljazeera.com/live/
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