AUGUST 2005
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Wednesday, 31st August,2005
TONGA - AT THE TIPPING POINT
Serious trouble in paradise, as strikes threaten to tear apart the normally peaceful Pacific island nation of Tonga. And the current unrest does not bode well for the ailing octogenarian Tongan King and his deeply unpopular son and heir to the throne, the Crown Prince. Alarmingly, Dateline's Chris Hammer, who was in Tonga last week, came across a most disturbing development - claims that Tongan extremists are talking about assassinating the royal family.
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Wednesday, 31st August,2005
MARY ROBINSON INTERVIEW
Back in 1990, Mary Robinson - lawyer, philosopher, activist and academic - burst onto the global scene when she became the first woman to be appointed President of Ireland. Later, for five years, she headed the UN High Commission for Human Rights, a tricky post if ever there was one. These days, she chairs an independent international body known as "The Ethical Globalization Initiative". Recently, she was here in Australia and George Negus caught up with her. Dateline talked at length about what many consider THE issue in the world right now: the so-called 'war against terror' versus democratic freedoms.
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Wednesday, 31st August,2005
ZIMBABWE - OPERATION TSUNAMI.
Zimbabwe, where there was jubilation in the parliament yesterday when Robert Mugabe's Government passed constitutional changes abolishing freehold title to land and giving parliament the power to deny passports to its critics. Back in the 1980s - after he rid his country of British colonial rule - Mugabe was hailed as a liberator and a national hero. But two decades is a hell of a long time in politics. These days, Robert Mugabe stands accused of presiding over a reign of terror that's seen tens of thousands of Zimbabweans violently displaced from their homes in what Mugabe, in his ever-so-sensitive style, calls "Operation Drive Out Trash." Zimbabwe, right now, is a country with some of the toughest media restrictions in the world and attempting to show what's actually going on there is both difficult and dangerous, particularly for Zimbabweans themselves. Reporter Ginny Stein spent the last three weeks there filming in Zimbabwe, secretly.
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Wednesday, 24th August,2005
ETHIOPIA-AFRICA'S GREAT HOPE.
Only a few months ago Ethiopia was being touted as the great hope of Africa. Not only was it one of a handful of African nations earmarked for G8 debt relief, it was being applauded for its apparent willingness to embrace democracy. That said Ethiopia's first multi-party ballot was anything but free and fair. In fact, it turned out to be what many cynics have come to expect from African elections - vote-rigging, intimidation and even murder - name your electoral poison. And the aftermath of the election has been no better. Olivia Rousset reports on why things have gone so sadly wrong in Ethiopia.
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Wednesday, 24th August,2005
WASSIM DOUREIHI INTERVIEW.
Yesterday allegedly extremist Islamic groups, like Hizb ut-Tahrir, were specifically excluded from the Prime Minister's talkfest in Parliament House with Muslim community leaders. Hizb ut-Tahrir insists on the primacy of Islamic law over secular Australian law and rejects the idea of the integration of Muslims into secular society. So where does yesterday's summit leave Hizb ut-Tahrir? And how do they feel about adopting so-called Australian values? Earlier this evening George Negus spoke with Wassim Doureihi, spokesman for Hizb ut-Tahrir.
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Wednesday, 24th August,2005
GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER.
Six years ago this month the Indonesian military unleashed its militia killers on East Timor, creating carnage that shocked the world and saw Australia intervene to drive them out. Dateline's John Martinkus, in East Timor during those awful days, recently returned to find that the dreaded militia are still around, seemingly beyond prosecution, including their ruthless leader Eurico Guterres. Not only that, there is the implicit threat of renewed violence if the international community tries to bring them to justice.
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Wednesday, 17th August,2005
MUNIR UPDATE
An update on a story we brought you earlier this year on the assassination of Indonesia's leading human rights activist, Munir Said Thalib, poisoned on a fateful Garuda Airlines flight out of Jakarta. The case continues to capture the imagination of the Indonesian public with attention now having shifted away from Garuda to the country's National Intelligence Agency. But, as David O'Shea reports, there are still plenty of legal and political hurdles ahead in the aftermath of Munir's death.
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Wednesday, 17th August,2005
ABDULLAH ABDULLAH INTERVIEW
No doubt the audacious Tolo team will be covering the September 18 national elections in Afghanistan. In fact, the campaign opened today - with warnings that women candidates could be in danger from tribal warlords and Islamic extremists such as the Taliban. Many argue that security generally is still poor in Afghanistan because too much valuable time has been lost with the US fighting its war in Iraq. Last month, after repeated pleas by the Afghan Government, Prime Minister John Howard recommitted SAS troops to Afghanistan to help in the fight against the Taliban and al-Qa'ida. With George Negus now in the studio, fresh off the plane from Kabul, is His Excellency, Dr Abdullah Abdullah, Afghanistan's Foreign Minister.
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Wednesday, 17th August,2005
TOLO TV-AFGHANISTAN'S AL JAZEERA?
Dateline’s first report tonight is from Dr Abdullah's homeland - a nation regarded by many as the first country America decided to shape in its own image, as it were, after the war on terror began on September 11, 2001. Despite all those early high hopes, post-Taliban, liberal democracy has not exactly 'flowered' in that badly battered land, at least not yet. But in the capital, Kabul, things are changing. Take the advent of television for instance. TV was absolutely taboo under the Islamic extremist Taliban but of late it's become a barometer of change in Afghanistan. And curiously, leading the charge is the family of a former Afghan diplomat who were actually raised in this country, complete with the old Aussie accent. Here's Ginny Stein.
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Wednesday, 10th August,2005
VANUATU
Of all the independence movements in this part of the world, the struggle of the West Papuans has been not only the loneliest, but also the most unreported. Since officially becoming part of Indonesia back in 1969, only one country, Vanuatu, has consistently raised the plight of the West Papuans at the international level. But that may be about to change. Indonesia's launched a diplomatic offensive aimed at "encouraging" Vanuatu to soften its pro-West Papuan stance and it's already created quite a stir among Vanuatu's politicians. Mark Davis went there for this next report.
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Wednesday, 10th August,2005
CAN IRAQ PROTECT ITS OILS?
Earlier this week, Peter Cosgrove, the country's recently retired Defence chief, dropped his very own bombshell when he declared that the presence of foreign troops in Iraq was a direct motivation for global terrorism and, not only that - the way to reduce the terrorist threat, here at home, he said, was to remove our Australian troops. He even nominated the end of next year as a reasonable withdrawal date. Crucial, of course, to any withdrawal strategy is their replacement by Iraqi troops, not just to provide security on the streets of Baghdad, but also in the protection of Iraq's critical oil lifeline. From the Persian Gulf, here's Bronwyn Adcock.
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Wednesday, 3rd August,2005
ASIO LEAKS.
Since the London terror attacks two weeks ago, both John Howard and his Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, have indicated they think this country's anti-terror laws may need to be hardened. As things stand, ASIO already has sweeping powers to question and detain people, including secrecy provisions that effectively close off any public scrutiny. Dateline's Thom Cookes has been looking at two recent cases of these laws in action. What Thom found is that when these secrecy provisions are accompanied by damaging leaks to the media, both the rights of the suspects and the accountability of the government are threatened.
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Wednesday, 3rd August,2005
GERRY ADAMS INTERVIEW
Late last week, when the IRA announced it was laying down its guns to end 36 years of armed struggle in Northern Ireland, many observers raised their eyebrows. Nevertheless, the IRA insists that this time it's for real, that they are, in fact, opting for peace and politics and, once and for all, putting terrorism behind them.
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An elated Tony Blair hailed the shock move as "a step of unparalleled magnitude" and later this week Tony Blair will meet with Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams and begin a staggered pullout of British troops from Northern Ireland. Yesterday George Negus caught up with Gerry Adams by satellite from Belfast. -
Wednesday, 3rd August,2005
FOOT IN MOUTH
Every now and then in this business, a story comes along that leaves you shaking your head and asking, "How on earth could they have ever allowed this to happen?" Well, what you're about to see falls squarely into that stunned and amazed category. Essentially, it's a story of how bureaucrats in Canberra gave the green light to beef imports from Brazil - a country with a history of the dreaded foot-and-mouth disease. Peter Martin has been investigating a decision that risked a $13-billion catastrophe.
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