[THEREGISTER.CO.UK] The US Federal Trade Commission has shuttered a New York-based tech support business, after scammers allegedly hoodwinked Facebook and Microsoft users into paying hundreds of dollars for tech advice from Pairsys Inc. So far, so good. I spent several hours last night cleaning the viri off my game-playing grandson's computer.
According to court documents filed by the consumer protection agency, the firm was accused of violating the FTC's rules on unfair or deceptive acts and misrepresentations or deceptive omissions in relation to commerce. Sounds pretty open and shut. Download a "game" called Blasteroids and then try and get rid of it. Be prepared to spend lots of time and maybe even some money.
It was claimed that Pairsys tricked consumers into believing that they had security or performance issues with their computers, such as viruses, spyware or system errors. The company apparently duped computer users with cold calls and misleading ads. The popups that say "Your system is at risk" tell you you've been infected. But Pairsys will be happy to sell you PC Optimizer. Costs vary depending on the size of your wallet.
All of which amounted to deception, the FTC alleged. No! Really?
The agency's Jessica Rich added: âThe defendants behind Pairsys (Uttam Saha and Tiya Bhattacharya) targeted seniors and other vulnerable populations, preying on their lack of computer knowledge to sell âsecurityâ software and programs that had no value at all. I'm usually against such things on principle, but if called on to vote whether to chop their heads off I'd likely be a yes.
âWe are pleased that the court has shut down the company for now, and we look forward to getting consumersâ money back in their pockets.â Their website is still up and running.
The FTC said that folk were told to pay between $149 and $249 for bogus warranty programs and software that was freely available online. It added that, in some cases, the defendants demanded $600 from the consumers they had fooled. "What's no longer in your wallet?"
It was alleged that Pairsys made nearly $2.5m from the scams since the start of 2012. The FTC hopes to see the company put out of business permanently. Do they really? What about the other 12,000 similar businesses? The case covered two years. Two years from now we'll see the same story, possibly with the same defendants (now residing in British Columbia or Yorkshire).
The agency said: "The defendants have agreed to the terms of a preliminary injunction issued by the court that prohibits the defendants in the case from making misrepresentations to consumers about what company they represent or whether consumers have viruses or spyware on their computer." But fraud's been a crime since before I was weaned. So why not give Uttam and Tiya enough jug time to grow old gracefully?
They are also banned from deceptive telemarketing practices, and may not sell or rent their customer lists to any third party. The injunction requires that their websites and telephone numbers must be shut down and disconnected, and their assets be frozen. The site's still up.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
What is their kickback arrangement with ATT and calls.
#5
However, the court is fine with scammers masquerading as MoH winners or Navy SEALS to gain influence, positioning, money, et al all for personal gain at the expense of others.
#11
#10 Your system was infected when you installed Windows on it.
That's more true than you might know. My computer came with Windows 8 installed. I did my usual and downloaded and installed a couple of free software protection products. They found a major trojan horse in the "recovery" partition. Took me forever to get to where I could keep it from loading. I just hope I don't have to re-install my software any time soon.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
10/27/2014 15:42 Comments ||
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#12
Free software protection products? You get what you pay for. In my experience some of the free so called virus protection packages that you can download from the internet are viruses in their own right.
Go to a reputable software/techie store and plunk down some actual money for a reputable software protection product. Get only one of them. Remove, if you can, the free products. If you have more that one of these packages they will go to war against each other and make your computer unworkable. Unfortunately, I don't know any of them that will protect you from Microsoft.
#13
Some of the 'paid-for' virus protection software are just as bad as Viruses. You have 'on access scan' which, along with Windows search bringing your system to a crawl - and then 'full scans' which beat your disks for hours - during the day.
[NBC] The nurse forcibly quarantined in New Jersey after she came home from treating Ebola patients in West Africa will be released Monday, state officials said. Kaci Hickox has been held against her will in a tent outside a New Jersey medical center since she was taken off a flight, flushed and distraught, Friday. Hickox has hired a lawyer and spoken out publicly against her quarantine.
"Since testing negative for Ebola on early Saturday morning, the patient being monitored in isolation at University Hospital in Newark has thankfully been symptom free for the last 24 hours," New Jersey health department officials said in a statement. "As a result, and after being evaluated in coordination with the CDC and the treating clinicians at University Hospital, the patient is being discharged."
The case quickly escalated over the weekend, with Hickox protesting from her confinement and scientists including Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, saying there was no medical basis to hold her. The White House even weighed in, pressing New York and New Jersey to reverse their decisions to quarantine all returning medical workers who have treated Ebola patients.
Hickox will be allowed to take private transport home to Maine. "Since the patient had direct exposure to individuals suffering from the Ebola Virus in one of the three West African nations, she is subject to a mandatory New Jersey quarantine order," the statement read. "Health officials in Maine have been notified of her arrangements and will make a determination under their own laws on her treatment when she arrives."
This could prove darkly amusing if Ms Hickox does subsequently develop symptoms in the next two weeks or so.
#5
She could have been the model for returning volunteers and set the historical standards. But instead she decided to be self centered and petty. She now has the potential for being patient zero and follow in the likes of Typhoid Mary.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
10/27/2014 13:17 Comments ||
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#6
Heard today the military is considering or going to implement a mandatory 21 day quarantine for military members coming back from ebola-infected areas of West Africa.
#8
The whining nurse, the CDC and the administration are the one's who look bad on this issue. This action against Christie's quarantine will probably do more for him politically than when he reigned in the NJ teacher's union. Citizens on both sides of the aisle are mostly for quarantines.
#10
Why is the Mobama's administration so vested in preventing state quarantines such that he called various governors about lifting their quarantines?
Quarantines may lead to border entry restrictions. Champ wants open borders, regardless of the risks involved.
#12
She almost certainly does not have Ebola. She should have been checked for fever and lacking one, transported to Maine to be quarantined at her home for an appropriate time.
If the health agencies sending people abroad cannot figure out how to manage their operation with this kind of reasonable precaution in countries without an epidemic like America, then they should not count on a lot of support from the American or other peoples.
#13
rammer, it takes time for even the fever to materialize. The biggest danger is the next four or five days, with the odds getting better out to 42 days after exposure.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
10/27/2014 23:13 Comments ||
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[NYT] The Champ administration has been pushing the governors of New York and New Jersey to reverse their decision ordering all medical workers returning from West Africa who had contact with Ebola patients to be quarantined, an administration official said on Sunday. States have no rights under the Champ regime. I thought everyone knew that.
But both governors, Andrew M. Cuomo of New York and Chris Christie of New Jersey, stood by their decision, saying that the federal guidelines did not go far enough. What "federal guidelines" ?
At the same time, the first person to be forced into isolation under the new protocols, Kaci Hickox, a nurse returning from Sierra Leone, planned to mount a legal challenge to the quarantine order. Despite having no symptoms, she has been kept under quarantine at a hospital in New Jersey, where she has been confined to a tent equipped with a portable toilet and no shower. On Sunday, she spoke to CNN about the way she has been treated, describing it as “inhumane.” "Inhumane"...? I know a few people who have deployed to Iraq an Afghanistan [for a lot longer than 21 days] who might disagree with her definition of "inhumane."
Ms. Hickox would not be in the U.S. today if I were in charge: she'd be at a mandatory isolation facility for health care workers who have had contact with Ebola patients.
That isolation facility would be in west Africa.
It would be comfortable: good beds, clean linens (the workers would change their own sheets), good food, internet, movies, and so on. They'd have light work to do in their own rooms -- paperwork and the like. They'd receive a month's salary for this based on their own country's average wages for health care workers.
And they wouldn't leave for 28 days.
If you volunteer to take care of Ebola patients, stay in quarantine for a month. We'll pay you and take care of you. But you don't come home to the U.S., or Europe, or wherever, until we know you're clean.
#3
Obviously, the Chief Thorist is urging us all to be banished to the Room of Seven Doors. Who needs Death Panels in Obe-care, when all you do is reverse mandatory quarantine orders ?
#4
If the Obama administration really believes that Ebola isn't that dangerous why don't they remove the Ebola virus from the official list of 'select agents' and permit research at a biosafety level lower than BSL-4?
#5
Why does the regime/CDC continue to say that you can not get ebola from someone unless they are showing symptoms? We come in contact with others who have contagious viruses such as measles, chickenpox, flu, etc. before they have symptoms and get the virus from them--that is one reason these viruses are so contagious. Why is this regime so vested in spreading this dangerous disease to the U.S? They have politicized science so much to achieve their agenda that no one can believe anything they say. Think for example of global warming/climate change.
[Tolo News] An Imam who was accused of raping a 10-year-old girl at his mosque last May was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a court in Kabul on Sunday.
The family of the girl, Brishna, and the civil society activists who have advocated on their behalf welcomed the decision made by the court and hope that the decision will stand upon appeal.
In an interview with TOLOnews, the family of the girl said they hope that the sentencing would dissuade other perpetrators from committing such crimes in the future.
In addition to the 20 year sentence, the Imam was handed down a 1.5 million Afs fine.
Brishna is traumatized by her ordeal, and often cries when someone says the name of the Imam - Aminullah Baraz - who raped her. She is meant to go to school and continue her life, but she has been unable to since the attack.
"My parents sent me to learn and I didn't know that he would be such a bad person," Brishna said. "I want him to be punished, he should not be released."
Brishna's father is deaf. He hopes to see Baraz sent to prison for life. "Justice should be preserved so others will send their children to mosques," Brishna's father said.
Women for Women, an international women's rights advocacy organization, has helped Brishna's family navigate the legal process. "The court trial was based on justice, this Imam was sentenced to twenty years in jail and one million five thousand Afs as a fine," said Banafsha Afaf Amiree, an official of Women for Women.
The mosque in which the rape took place is in a rural part of Akti Gunbad district in Kunduz province.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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Remove his pee-pee, no recividism, problem solved.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/27/2014 12:11 Comments ||
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But will he serve 20 years, Hell no.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/27/2014 12:22 Comments ||
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#4
When you rape a 10 year old, your switchboard is permanently wired wrong. 20 years in the slammer will not do anything. You are dealing with a broken person here who is beyond any cure, but rather a menace to society. You must protect the public from this monster.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/27/2014 13:03 Comments ||
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#5
So, when will the 10 yr. Old be hung or stoned?
Posted by: chris ||
10/27/2014 17:15 Comments ||
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[Al Ahram] Activists pushing for women's right-to-drive in Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... declared their online campaign a success Sunday.
The kingdom is the world's only country where women are not allowed to operate cars.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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dont think women are allowed to drive in somalia either thanks to al shabaab funded by saudi
[ARABNEWS] Kuwait's privately owned Jazeera Airways is preparing to bid for a big stake in state-run flag carrier Kuwait Airways, Jazeera's chairman told Rooters. If the deal goes through, it will be a sign that the business scene is changing in the Gulf.
For several decades, Gulf Arab economies have been dominated by the heavy hand of the state. Governments' huge oil revenues have eclipsed private sector activity. Benefiting from these revenues, state-owned firms have prospered while many private companies have struggled to raise financing and become ensnared in official red tape.
But pressures are growing for a new model. North Africa's Arab Spring uprisings of 2011, fuelled by high unemployment, underlined to Gulf governments the need to create jobs for their citizens -- and to enlist the private sector in that effort.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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[ARABNEWS] Gulf states, which have based their budgets on an oil price of $80 a barrel or less, are likely to remain relatively sanguine about current oil market conditions, say Saudi-based economists and analysts.
Their assessment follows International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde's recent warning that Gulf states would face budget shortfalls if the recent decline in oil prices persists.
"A sustained decline of $25 a barrel in the oil price would reduce the revenues of most Gulf countries by eight percent of gross domestic product, and put many of them into a fiscal deficit situation," Lagarde told news hounds on the sidelines of a conference in Kuwait City.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
"That which cannot go on forever, will not -"
The Instapundit
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
10/27/2014 12:53 Comments ||
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[Al Ahram] Parts of Britannia are "under siege" from immigration, prompting the government to look at ways to stem the number of EU workers arriving, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said Sunday.
"In some areas of the UK, down the east coast, towns do feel under siege, (with) large numbers of migrant workers and people claiming benefits," Fallon told the BBC.
"We are looking at changing that to make sure there is some control. We are fully entitled to say this is making a difference to us, that now needs to be dealt with."
Fallon said London was determined to push ahead with immigration reforms, despite a blunt warning on Saturday from German Chancellor Angela Merkel ...current chancellor of Germany. She was educated in East Germany when is was still run by commies, but in 1989 got involved with the growing democracy movement when the Berlin Wall fell. Merkel is sometimes referred to by Germans as Mom... that any attempts to "tamper with the fundamental principles of free movement in the EU" would not be tolerated by Britannia's European partners.
"The Germans haven't seen our proposals yet and we haven't seen our proposals yet, and that's still being worked on at the moment to see what we can do to prevent whole towns and communities being swamped by huge numbers of migrants," Fallon said.
British Prime Minister David Cameron ... has stated that he is certainly a big Thatcher fan, but I don't know whether that makes me a Thatcherite, which means he's not. Since he is not deeply ideological he lacks core principles and is easily led. He has been described as certainly not a Pitt, Elder or Younger, but he does wear a nice suit so maybe he's Beau Brummel ... 's Conservative Party is aiming to curb immigration, as it faces increased electoral pressure from the anti-EU UK Independence Party.
Unless the prime minister can woo back right-wing voters tempted by UKIP's hardline rhetoric, party faithful fear that they will lose next year's general election to the Labour Party.
Under EU rules, citizens of most EU countries have the right to live and work in any other EU country.
Cameron has vowed to offer Britons a referendum by 2017 on whether to stay in the EU or not, if his party wins the 2015 election.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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if it is the 6 million muslims from france that are the 'eu workers' then it's too late the barbarians are inside the walls already
#3
Ship them halfway back to where they came from; mid-air or mid-ocean release will work.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
10/27/2014 6:57 Comments ||
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This seems so familiar
Posted by: chris ||
10/27/2014 8:41 Comments ||
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IT is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say:--
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!
It is always a temptation to a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say:--
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say:--
"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
Nor matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"
I would imagine that purchasing crude from Algeria or Russia for dilutant would drive up the cost of refining Venezuelan crude in a market where prices have fallen 25%. Hat tip: gCaptain.
Oil tanker Carabobo, bringing Venezuela’s first import of crude oil, arrived late on Saturday at the Jose port, where it is scheduled to unload up to 2 million barrels of Algerian Saharan Blend to be used as a diluent for Venezuela’s extra heavy crude, according to Reuters tanker tracking data.
Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA has ordered four deliveries of foreign light crudes in recent weeks, including Algerian Saharan Blend and Russia’s Urals, to replace purchases of the costly heavy naphtha it had been using as diluent.
After signing a supply contract with Algeria’s state-run Sonatrach, Saharan Blend supplies will arrive at Venezuelan ports while Russian shipments are scheduled to arrive during November to Isla refinery, operated by PDVSA in the Caribbean island of Curacao.
The very large crude carrier (VLCC) Carabobo has not started the unloading process, according to the data.
A portion of the Algerian crude purchases will be mixed with Orinoco belt’s extra heavy oil while a 270,000 barrel per day (bpd) crude upgrader plant operated by PDVSA, Norway’s Statoil and France’s Total is halted for maintenance starting in early November, the state-run oil company said.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/27/2014 12:48 ||
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next up? Sand for Saudi Arabia
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/27/2014 13:40 Comments ||
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If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand. - Milton Friedman
...of course there would be a surplus of party members government bureaucrats and regulations.
#3
No, Commodore Frank. Saudis will import Venezuelan Orinoco heavy crude to thicken up their light sweet crude, heh.
All kidding aside, Venezuela's reserves are supposed to exceed Saudi Arabia's. However with the more difficult extraction and refining issues of Venezuela's heavy crude, coupled with China's involvement in Venezuela's oil industry as a rescuer of the country for a righteous fee and cheap oil(China importing 640,000 bbl/day of which 200,000 goes to servicing the debt), I would say that the Venezuelan people and govt are well and truly screwed.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/27/2014 15:34 Comments ||
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#4
Venezuela's Orinoco oil is viscous and has to be refined in special refineries.
I guess cutting the oil with sweeter crude is intended as a workaround while the crude upgraders are down for maintenance.
Posted by: One Bandersnatch ||
10/27/2014 15:50 Comments ||
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#5
They were using Naptha, not sure why they changed diludents.
#6
Shipman---the substitution of light crude is ostensibly is to save money from buying naptha. But I wonder what the total cost of each is, when you do the dilutions, add transportation costs, etc etc. Who knows what kind of arithmetic is used in the evaluation of alternatives in Venezuela?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
10/27/2014 18:54 Comments ||
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A table to indicate which party gained what. Most notable is that the Ukrainian communists failed to gain a seat.
[Iran Press TV] Exit polls show that pro-Western and nationalist parties have won Ukraine's parliamentary elections after refusal by millions of people in the restive east to take part in the vote.
According to the exit polls, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko Bloc, comprised of his own Solidarity Party and Udar Party, led by boxer Vitali Klitschko, took 23 percent of the votes cast on Sunday. The bloc was followed by the People's Front led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, which garnered 21 percent.
Members of Ukraine's 450-seat Supreme Council, also known as the Verkhovna Rada, serve five-year terms.
In nationally televised comments after the election, Poroshenko thanked the voters for backing his plans, especially the country's attempts to become a member of the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
"More than three quarters of voters who took part in the polls gave strong and irreversible backing to Ukraine's path to Europe," Poroshenko said.
He added that a majority of the voters also supported his search for political solutions to end the conflict in the country's east. Poroshenko noted that he would start talks on forming a coalition with other pro-Western parties in the parliament on Monday.
The vote was called in August as Poroshenko came under pressure to purge the parliament of politicians who were allegedly tied to the tossed government of Viktor Yanukovych.
The elections came amid ongoing fighting between the Ukrainian army and pro-Russian forces in the volatile east. Some three million voters in areas of the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, which are under the control of pro-Russian forces, were unable to cast ballots.
The leaders of these regions are scheduling their own elections for early November.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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[THEREGISTER.CO.UK] More than 30,000 people have pledged to stage a protest against Hungary's proposed internet tax law in the capital on Sunday.
Viktor Orban's government is planning to tax internet traffic from the beginning of 2015, according to a bill submitted to Hungary's parliament on Tuesday.
But it's not just the public that is against the plan. Hungary's opposition party said the law would send the country back to the 1990s. Telco companies have condemned the plan, including Deutsche Telekom subsidiary Magyar Telekom ‐ even Steelie Neelie herself has spoken against it.
"Unilateral internet taxes are not a clever idea. It will increase internet access prices for consumers. Hungary is already below the EU average on virtually every digital indicator. This isn't going to help. Shame on them!" said Europe's Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes.
Hungary already has a tax on voice calls and text messages, but the amount is capped at â¬2.27 a month for individuals and â¬16.26 for companies. There is no indication yet of the value of any possible caps for the new internet tax. Economy minister Mihaly Varga defended the plan this week, saying it could generate annual revenue of â¬65m.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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#1
Meanwhile, during the protest normal people's connect speed finally floated up towards advertised levels, due to all the bandwidth hogs being at the protest.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
10/27/2014 7:52 Comments ||
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[DAWN] The recent confirmation of polio virus in two siblings despite their vaccination during routine anti-polio drives and half a dozen additional boosters in special campaigns has raised serious questions over the very efficacy of the vaccine.
Officials conveniently put the blame on lack of immunity among the siblings for the crippling disease despite being inoculated and said it might have been caused by malnutrition or some other genetic reasons.
But a senior official in the provincial health ministry admitted that such incidents raised many questions over the very efficacy of the vaccine and the cold chain system, which had been reported not up to the mark by the authorities from time to time. Maybe they oughta buy the same brand everybody else uses instead of buying from the pharmaceutical company run by somebody's brother-in-law. If a kid's had three doses of the vaccine and still comes down with it, you're using the wrong vaccine.
It does help if you're not relying on djinns to do the mixing, too.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/27/2014 00:00 ||
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[Ynet] India will invest $ 86 million in development and facilities Chabahar Port in Southern Iran, reported Iranian news agency "Press TV". The port would give India an access route to Afghanistan and Central Asia through Iran's eastern borders.
More money to prop up the ambitions of the Mad Mullahs...
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
David Cameron
