JULY 2007
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Wednesday, 1st August,2007
THE NUCLEAR RENAISSANCE
About 20 years ago, it would have been almost impossible to imagine nuclear reactors being seen as potential world savers. Back then of course the catastrophes of Chernobyl and Three Mile Island were fresh in our minds. Concepts like global warming certainly weren't. Now there is a nuclear plant building boom under way and John Howard of course is highly enthusiastic about the nuclear option. That said, even with the newest technology, nuclear is hardly a totally fail-safe option. The nuclear research reactor at Lucas Heights in Sydney was shut down for repairs after three uranium fuel plates came loose. For the latest on the pros and cons for the still contentious nuclear option, we sent reporter Aaron Lewis off on a whip around the world.
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Wednesday, 1st August,2007
DAVID O'SHEA INTERVIEW
Dateline contacted Peter Russo, Mohamed Haneef's in India. Mr Russo was emphatic that Dr Haneef had no link with al-Qaeda and during his record of interview, from memory, the word “al-Qaeda had” not been used. So what is this three and a half bit page document all about? How did David O'Shea come about it, and what, if any significance does it have?
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VIDEO: David O'Shea interview -
Wednesday, 1st August,2007AT HOME WITH MRS HANEEF
How many more twists and turns can there be in the case of Dr Mohamed Haneef? Material released by Kevin Andrews justifying his revoking of Haneef’s visa has been rubbished by his legal team. But federal police commissioner Mick Keelty said further charges could yet be recommended against Dr Haneef and a second Indian doctor interrogated last month remained a person of interest to investigators. Back in his home town of Bangalore, Haneef himself is now openly campaigning to get his visa back, holding press conferences and accusing the Howard Government of a conspiracy against him. As the story developed here in Australia spare a thought for Haneef's wife, Firdous back in India with a new born baby and wondering what might become of her husband. Dateline journalist David O'Shea was with Mrs Haneef in Bangalore. Apart from meeting the family, David came across an intriguing document.
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VIDEO: At home with Mrs Haneef -
Wednesday, 25th July,2007
SANKARSHAN THAKUR INTERVIEW
Meanwhile, late this afternoon, before the DPP's announcement, George Negus spoke with Sankarshan Thakur, the executive editor of 'Tehelka', India's independent English language weekly newspaper and online news service.
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Wednesday, 25th July,2007
PORTUGUESE POWER
As Dateline have been hearing with monotonous regularity of late, in the context of the climate change debate, this country still pretty much relies on coal and gas for its energy. John Howard, of course, to the ire of the anti-uranium lobby, is enthusiastically advocating that, whatever else is in there, nuclear has to be part of any future mix. But there's at least one other country, one with a few geographic similarities to this one, that's going down a very different energy path. Every northern summer, tourists flock to delightfully unpretentious Portugal, for the sun, for the surf and for a spot of sailing. Portugal's never short of a decent breeze. Invariably, after the 'touroes' head off back home, they leave behind more than their fair share of rubbish. But, oddly enough, these are the very things that have become the basic ingredients of a quite spectacular energy revolution in Portugal. Here's David Brill.
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Wednesday, 25th July,2007
IMRAN SIDDIQUI & PETER RUSSO INTERVIEW
Some breaking news - the confused and confusing case of Mohamed Haneef drags on and while the Howard Government, at least, seems happy with how it's being handled. Rather more unhappy are the still-detained Haneef, his lawyers, many others in the Australian legal profession, human rights activists, Dr Haneef's family, the Indian Government and the Indian media. And now, late today, in a serious turn in the case, the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions announced that he would be personally reviewing all material relating to the case against Haneef, the accused "reckless supporter" of terrorism. A short time ago, from Canberra, George Negus spoke with Mohamed Haneef's lawyer, Peter Russo, and Imran Siddiqui, his wife's cousin, who is currently in Australia.
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Wednesday, 18th July,2007
WILD BOARDS - THE SEQUEL
Recall Mark Davis's recent piece from PNG, where the locals at the Sunset Beach Surf Club have been shooting the curl for years, cutting their boards from local timber. They needed more boards, especially the young up-and-comers. When Dateline prodded Dateline viewers for help, they responded magnificently.
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Wednesday, 18th July,2007
HUGH WHITE INTERVIEW
George Negus spoke with Professor Hugh White, head of the Strategic Studies Centre at the ANU in Canberra.
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For video see "The Surge" video
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Wednesday, 18th July,2007
DR KIMBERLY KAGAN & MICHAEL WARE
The so-called US surge in Iraq, basically, an extra 30,000 troops, is aimed at pacifying the violence in Bagdad. But it has actually provoked another war, a war of words, in Washington. Daily, rebel Republicans are queuing up to dump on George W’s increasingly unpopular Iraq strategy. The dissident senators are urging a phased US withdrawal by April next year. Unimpressed, George Bush says he won’t budge until he hears a progress report from his commander in Iraq, due in September. So with a raging debate in Washington, all but non-existent here, Dateline took up the contentious surge issue with Michael Ware, CNN’s correspondent in Bagdad and war historian and leading neo-conservative Dr Kimberly Kagan in Washington.
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Wednesday, 18th July,2007
FROM CUBA WITH LOVE
If his dodgy health permits, in less than two years' time Cuba's Fidel Castro will celebrate half a century of communism in his tiny Caribbean island nation of Cuba, but with the 80-year-old leader still looking pretty frail like Cuba's economy, many are asking whether his stubborn Marxist revolution will survive his inevitable passing. It's hard to know what Cubans think of his regime because most are afraid of speaking out. But Dateline reporter David O'Shea, armed with only his trusty video camera plus his fluent Spanish, hit the streets of Havana to see what he could find out. As you will soon discover, not inappropriately, David has called his report "From Cuba with Love."
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See the full video here -
Wednesday, 11th July,2007
PALM OIL – GREEN GOLD?
Back in March this year when John Howard and Malcolm Turnbull announced that Australia would spend the best part of $200 million over the next five years to help curb deforestation in Indonesia, there was loud applause. It was an apparently bold initiative that according to PM would have more impact on climate change than signing up to the Kyoto protocol. Something he has made clear he has no intention of doing. But it turns out to be a little more complicated than that. When we sent Ginny Stein off to the wilds of Borneo she found that forests were being felled to make way for a new sustainable biofuel made from palm oil. Is that an environmental paradox or what?
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Wednesday, 11th July,2007
MICHAEL SCHEUER INTERVIEW
For years he headed up the CIA unit that hunted the worlds most notorious fugitive Osama bin Laden. After a career that spanned a couple of decades spooking the US enemies he wrote two best sellers including one about bin Laden entitled ‘Radical Islam and the future of America.’ Back then as a former CIA operative Michael Scheuer couldn't hut his name to his own books. These days however he's well and truly out from behind his pot plant and his message is brutally frank, the West is losing the war on terror. George Negus talked to him earlier this evening here in the studio.
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Wednesday, 11th July,2007
TAMIL ABDUCTIONS
Most Australians would probably be blissfully unaware that tens of thousands of Sri Lankan born Tamils living peacefully in this country thousands of kilometres from the violence that's been plaguing their homeland for decades. In recent months however the terror and anguish experienced by families in Sri Lanka has been visited on their relatives here in Australia. Dateline's been told of 18 separate case of Tamils, Australian citizens, permanent residents or their relatives who have been kidnapped back in Sri Lanka and held for ransom. Some have been released but the lives of others still hang in the balance. Nick Lazaredes has investigated three Sydney families caught up in this epidemic of abductions. Understandably they were prepared to talk so long as we didn't reveal their identities.
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Wednesday, 4th July,2007
THE SIEGE OF NAHR EL-BARED
Seven weeks ago outside Tripoli in Northern Lebanon, the Lebanese army began shelling Islamic militants holed up in the Nahr el-Bared refugee camp. Since the battle began more than 80 Lebanese soldiers have been killed but the militants are still holding on to the camp. Thousands of Palestinian refugees have been forced to flee, others are still trapped inside. This is the worst internal violence in Lebanon since the civil war ended in 1990. And Sophie McNeill, now living in Beirut, has been following the plight of the refugees.
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Wednesday, 4th July,2007
LORETTA NAPOLEONI INTERVIEW
The links between the doctors arrested over the failed attacks and Dr Mohammed Haneef on the Gold Coast raise more questions than answers. While British police seem confident that they have detained all suspects, and are coming to Australia to interview Dr Haneef, what are we to make of this medical cabal? Loretta Napoleoni has spent decades tracking terror networks and their financiers, and advises several governments on counter-terrorism. She is currently a senior partner of a British risk assessment agency. Mark Davis spoke with her a short while ago from London.
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Wednesday, 4th July,2007
TURKEY ON THE TURN
It has been a turbulent couple of months in Turkey. There have been massive demonstrations there against the government and threats of a military coup. The demonstrators accuse the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan of trying to turn secular democratic Turkey into an Islamic state. To end the chaos, Erdogan called an election to be held in 2.5 weeks time. Mark Davis went to Turkey as the election campaign got under way and found a country deeply divided over the role of religion in its political future.
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