Scrap dollar as sole reserve currency: U.N. report

Reuters, Louis Charbonneau, UNITED NATIONS, Tue Jun 29, 2010 4:56pm EDT

(Reuters) - A new United Nations report released on Tuesday calls for abandoning the U.S. dollar as the main global reserve currency, saying it has been unable to safeguard value.

But several European officials attending a high-level meeting of the U.N. Economic and Social Council countered by saying that the market, not politicians, would determine what currencies countries would keep on hand for reserves.

"The dollar has proved not to be a stable store of value, which is a requisite for a stable reserve currency," the U.N. World Economic and Social Survey 2010 said.

The report says that developing countries have been hit by the U.S. dollar's loss of value in recent years.

"Motivated in part by needs for self-insurance against volatility in commodity markets and capital flows, many developing countries accumulated vast amounts of such (U.S. dollar) reserves during the 2000s," it said.

The report supports replacing the dollar with the International Monetary Fund's special drawing rights (SDRs), an international reserve asset that is used as a unit of payment on IMF loans and is made up of a basket of currencies.

"A new global reserve system could be created, one that no longer relies on the United States dollar as the single major reserve currency," the U.N. report said.

The report said a new reserve system "must not be based on a single currency or even multiple national currencies but instead, should permit the emission of international liquidity -- such as SDRs -- to create a more stable global financial system."

"Such emissions of international liquidity could also underpin the financing of investment in long-term sustainable development," it said.

MARKETS DECIDE

Jomo Kwame Sundaram, a Malaysian economist and the U.N. assistant secretary general for economic development, told a news conference that "there's going to be resistance" to the idea.

"In the whole post-war period, we've essentially had a dollar-based system," he said, adding that the gradual emission of SDRs could help countries phase out the dollar.

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, who previously chaired a U.N. expert commission that considered ways of overhauling the global financial system, has advocated the creation of a new reserve currency system, possibly based on SDRs.

Russia and China have also supported the idea.

But Paavo Vayrynen, Finland's Foreign Trade and Development Minister, told reporters that he doubted it was possible "to make any political or administrative decisions how to formulate the currency system in the world."

"It is based on the markets," he said. "I believe that the economic players in the market are going to have the decisive influence on that issue."

European Union development commissioner Andris Piebalgs said it would be a bad idea to dictate what the reserve currency should be.

"It is markets that decide," he said. "Any intervention would just create additional challenges and make things even less predictable."

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Secret Kennedy ET briefing strengthens UFO assassination theories

examiner.com, June 25, 11:15 AM, Honolulu Exopolitics Examiner, Michael Salla, Ph.D.

Attorney General Robert Kennedy &
Pres. John Kennedy. (Photo JFK Library)

A newly released video interview reveals that Robert Kennedy, while U.S. Attorney General, received a classified briefing on a crashed UFO that was extraterrestrial in origin, and whose technology was secretly being reverse engineered. According to Lt Colonel Philip Corso, who served as head of the U.S. Army’s Foreign Technology Desk from 1961-1963, he personally briefed Kennedy about the Army’s effort to seed extraterrestrial technologies into the private sector. Interviewed shortly before his death in 1998, Corso revealed for the first time that Bobby Kennedy contacted him for his knowledge on highly classified national security information. Corso from 1953-1957 had served in a number of National Security Council committees during the Eisenhower administration as the Army Liaison reporting directly to Lt General Arthur Trudeau who was head of U.S. Army Intelligence. Corso’s revelation is further evidence that President Kennedy was aware of the extraterrestrial origins of UFOs. Kennedy sought to gain information on UFOs from various sources in order to re-establish direct Presidential control. It is very likely that this is the reason Bobby Kennedy sought Corso out. Corso’s revelation adds to evidence that President Kennedy’s efforts to gain oversight over UFOs played a role in his 1963 assassination. Importantly, Corso provides an insight into how the UFO issue may have also been a factor in the death of Marilyn Monroe and the 1968 assassination of Robert Kennedy.

In his interview, Corso said:

• "I discussed this very thoroughly with Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general, the President’s brother… He knew about the flying saucers, I talked to him about it. I used to meet him when he was attorney general right in his office… What went to Bobby went to the President also."

Corso was aware that Robert Kennedy was a direct conduit to the President who was constantly briefed by his brother. Corso further explained in the interview that the meeting(s) happened in 1962, soon after Corso had testified on a Senate Committee about classified national security issues. At the time Corso was in charge of the Foreign Technology Desk, and reported directly to General Trudeau who then headed the Army’s Research and Development Division. Corso explained that he agreed to testify on the condition that his testimony was to be relayed directly to the Kennedy brothers. According to Corso, he was soon after contacted by Robert Kennedy who wanted to learn more about Corso’s knowledge and activities. Robert Kennedy’s role in learning about UFOs made him a key figure in ensuring that classified information the Kennedy brothers had gained about extraterrestrial life and technology would not be leaked to the public.

Robert Kennedy was allegedly involved in silencing Marilyn Monroe who in 1962 was prepared to blow the whistle on President Kennedy’s secret visit to an Air Force base to see alien bodies. A leaked unconfirmed Top Secret CIA wiretap summary of conversations concerning Monroe and the Kennedy brothers states:

• Rothberg indicated in so many words, that she [Monroe] had secrets to tell, no doubt arising from her trists [sic] with the President and the Attorney General. One such "secret" mentions the visit by the President at a secret air base for the purpose of inspecting things from outer space. Kilgallen replied that she knew what might be the source of visit [sic]. In the mid-fifties Kilgallen learned of secret effort by US and UK governments to identify the origins of crashed spacecraft and dead bodies, from a British government official. Kilgallen believed the story may have come from the New Mexico story [Roswell] in the late forties.

If Monroe was indeed aware of President Kennedy’s secret visit to see downed alien life and technology, and was about to blow the whistle, then she was a security threat. She directly jeopardized the Kennedy brothers efforts to restore direct Presidential oversight of extraterrestrial related issues. The stakes couldn’t be higher since President Kennedy had so far been frustrated in his efforts to regain control of UFO information from the CIA. If Monroe blew the whistle, the Kennedys would have zero chance of learning anything from the secretly appointed officials in charge of extraterrestrial affairs. Significantly, Robert Kennedy was sighted in Monroe’s house shortly before her death:

• Norman Jeffries who worked with Marilyn's housekeeper Eunice Murray and helped around the house, said that some men came to Marilyn's house around 10:00 pm the night of her death. One man recognized by Mr. Jeffries was Robert Kennedy, who was accompanied by two men he didn't know. Elizabeth Pllard, who lived right next door to Marilyn and held bridge parties every Saturday night states that she saw Bobby Kennedy and two other men walk right past the window, headed for Marilyn's house, and one of the men was carrying a small black bag of the sort that a doctor would carry. According to Norman Jeffries, Bobby and the two mystery men entered the house and ordered Norman and Eunice to leave. Marilyn Munroe biographer Donald Wolfe quotes Norman as saying, "I mean they made it clear we were to be gone."

It appears that Robert Kennedy was a factor in the silencing and/or assassination of Monroe, and that this happened because of the security threat she posed to the Kennedy brothers efforts to restore direct Presidential oversight over the extraterrestrial issue.

Significantly, the leaked CIA transcript of the wiretap conversation of Monroe was signed by James [Jesus] Angleton, chief of counterintelligence for the CIA. Angleton’s CIA counterintelligence was closely involved in maintaining security for classified UFO files. Angleton closely watched Monroe and the Kennedy brothers to find out what they had learned about UFOs, and if they posed a security threat to the system created to secretly maintain information about extraterrestrial life and technology.

Even more importantly, another leaked document reveals that Angleton, two days before President Kennedy’s assassination on November 22, 1963, was in possession of a number of secret directives concerning the release of classified UFO information. One of these was a cryptic Assassination Directive that permitted the silencing/termination of public officials that threatened the security and oversight system created for secretly managing extraterrestrial affairs. The Directive states:

• "Draft - Directive Regarding Project Environment - When conditions become non-conducive for growth in our environment and Washington cannot be influenced any further, the weather is lacking any precipitation … it should be wet."

Dr Robert Wood who is the foremost expert in analyzing MJ-12 documents using forensic methods, has concluded that the burned document is an assassination directive. There is evidence suggesting that the assassination directive was carried out by a secret unit under the control of Angleton’s CIA counterintelligence division against President Kennedy.

Corso’s revelations about briefing Robert Kennedy on UFOs suggests that the Kennedy brothers were sufficiently informed about extraterrestrial life and technology, to pose a direct challenge to those managing extraterrestrial affairs. The ensuing struggle between the Kennedy brothers and the controllers of UFO/extraterrestrial information was a very high stakes affair. While Robert Kennedy may have been involved in the silencing/assassination of Marilyn Monroe over her threats to blow the whistle on the President’s secret visit to see a downed UFO and alien bodies, Robert Kennedy may himself have been ultimately assassinated due to his UFO knowledge. The 1968 assassination of then Senator Robert Kennedy put a final end to the Kennedy brothers efforts to restore direct Presidential control over extraterrestrial life and technology.

Source: Examiner.com

Former WNBC Radio producer Lee Speigel (now a writer for AOL News) organized a meeting of military, scientific and psychological experts with U.N. Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim on July 14, 1978, to plan a presentation to the U.N. Special Political Committee. Topic: the importance of establishing an international UFO study panel. (Photo: Lee Spiegel)

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Supreme Court rejects Vatican appeal in sex abuse case

Reuters, James Vicini, WASHINGTON, Mon Jun 28, 2010 11:46am EDT

A protestor recites the rosary outside the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles July 15, 2007. (Credit: Reuters/Mario Anzuoni)

(Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court refused on Monday to consider whether the Vatican has legal immunity over the sexual abuse of minors by priests in the United States, allowing a lawsuit filed in 2002 to go forward.

The nation's highest court, asked to rule on a U.S. appeals court decision that cleared the way for the lawsuit to proceed, rejected the Vatican's immunity appeal without comment.

The lawsuit, filed by a plaintiff identified only as John Doe, claimed he was sexually abused on several occasions in the mid-1960s when he was 15 or 16 by a Roman Catholic priest named Father Andrew Ronan.

According to court documents, Ronan molested boys in the mid-1950s as a priest in Ireland and then in Chicago before his transfer to a church in Portland, Oregon, where he allegedly abused the victim who filed the lawsuit. Ronan died in 1992.

The Vatican claimed immunity under a U.S. law, the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976, that allows foreign states to avoid being sued in court.

But the law contains exceptions. The appeals court cited one of those, ruling the lawsuit has sufficiently alleged that Ronan was an employee of the Vatican acting within the scope of his employment under Oregon law.

Pope Benedict met victims of abuse by priests during his April 2008 visit to the United States. The U.S. church has paid $2 billion in settlements to victims since 1992.

In recent months, child abuse allegations against Catholic priests have rocked the United States and Europe, forcing resignations of bishops in Ireland, Belgium and Germany in the biggest crisis in Benedict's five-year pontificate.

In the Oregon case, the Obama administration backed the Vatican and said the appeals court erred in ruling that a victim's claim of sexual abuse by a priest falls within the exception to foreign sovereign immunity law.

But administration lawyers said the ruling did not warrant review by the Supreme Court "at this time."

(Editing by John O'Callaghan)

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G20 urges phasing out of fossil fuel subsidies

Reuters, Caren Bohan, TORONTO, Sun Jun 27, 2010 3:22pm EDT

President Obama arrives at G20 World Summit in Toronto, Canada to talk international economic reform. (AP Photo)

(Reuters) - Leaders of the world's biggest economies will pledge on Sunday to phase out subsidies for "inefficient" fossil fuels, in a statement toughened at the last minute at the urging of the United States, Group of 20 sources said.

The G20 communique in Toronto calls for the "phase out over the medium term of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption, taking into account vulnerable groups and their development needs," said the sources, who provided the language to Reuters.

The leaders also said they would review progress toward that goal at future summits. The sources said the United States had pushed to removed watered-down language from an earlier draft.

An earlier version of the statement referred to "voluntary, member-specific approaches" to getting rid of fossil fuel subsidies but made no mention of a review of the progress.

Environmentalists viewed that as a weak commitment compared with promises made at the previous G20 summit in Pittsburgh last September.

At that gathering, hosted by President Barack Obama, leaders also vowed to phase out the subsidies. They said that jettisoning them by 2020 would reduce greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming by 10 percent by 2050. The G20 had cited data from the International Energy Agency and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The Toronto statement revived language from Pittsburgh that called for the development of time frames and strategies to implement the phase-out of subsidies.

The communique made reference to the BP Plc oil spill on the U.S. Gulf Coast. The leaders urged the sharing of best practices to protect marine life and prevent accidents and to deal with the consequences when accidents occur.

(Reporting by Caren Bohan and Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Peter Cooney)

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G8 summit pledges new aid to mothers and young children

BBC News, by Andrew Walker, Saturday, 26 June 2010 09:38 UK

Toronto Improving the health of mothers
and children is a leading development goal

The G8 summit has agreed to provide a further $5bn (£3.3bn) over five years towards improving the health of mothers and young children in the developing world.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper made the announcement at the summit in Toronto.

The funds are intended to help tackle one of the international targets known as the UN Millennium Development Goals.

But anti-poverty groups say the pledge does not meet the scale of the problem.

Together with other donations, including one from the Gates Foundation, the full pledge will amount to $7.3bn.

One of the Millennium Development Goals is to reduce by three-quarters the death rate among mothers and young children.

Mr Harper said he would like to achieve even more.

"We are committed to moving the world towards the day when women in developing countries will not die or suffer disabilities from pregnancy or childbirth," he told reporters.

However development lobby groups say they are disappointed by the $5bn pledge.

One said the initiative failed to meet the needs of many mothers and children in the poorest parts of the world.

Campaigners have also heavily criticised the G8 for falling short on a promise made at a previous summit to increase total development aid.

US economy can 'no longer drive global growth'

BBC News, Thursday, 24 June 2010 21:58 UK

Mr Geithner played down differences between the US and Europe

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has told the BBC that the world "can not depend as much on the US economy as it did in the past".

In an exclusive interview, Mr Geithner said that other major economies would have to grow more for the global economy to prosper.

He also played down any differences in policy between the US and Europe regarding deficit reduction.

Mr Geithner was speaking ahead of a G20 meeting this weekend.

Common goals

Many European governments have implemented severe austerity measures in recent weeks in order to cut debt levels.

In a letter to G20 leaders last week, US President Barack Obama warned against cutting national debts too quickly as it would put economic recovery at risk.

But Mr Geithner said that the US and Europe "have much more in common that we have differences".

"We all agree that we have to restore responsibility to our fiscal positions. Everyone agrees that those deficits have to come down over time to a level that's sustainable," he said.

But he said that the US and Europe would take "different paths, at a different pace" in order to reach the common goal.

"It's going to require different things as we have different strengths and weaknesses," he said.

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US court throws out Conrad Black's fraud conviction

Radio Netherlands Worldwide, 24 June 2010 - 4:37pm

The US Supreme Court on Thursday set aside the corporate fraud conviction of Anglo-Canadian media mogul Conrad Black and sent the case back to a lower court.

"We vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion," the Supreme Court ruled.

Black, 64, who once headed the world's third-largest media empire, was convicted in July 2007 of stealing millions of dollars from the sales of newspapers being off-loaded by Hollinger International.

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Cooperation Needed in Shift to Multi-Currency Global Reserve System - Report

Asian Development Bank, 24 June 2010

MANILA, PHILIPPINES - A reform in the global reserve system is critical to avoid a repeat of the recent global economic crisis and Asia's fast recovering countries need to cooperate to ensure a smooth transition to a multi-currency alternative, says a new report from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Columbia University's Earth Institute.

The report, The Future Global Reserve System - An Asian Perspective, says that while the US dollar will remain the leading currency of international exchange for now, a rebalancing in the global economy means that in the future, a wider range of currencies will need to be used to settle trade and investment.

"Our current global reserve system, unfortunately, is not functioning too well," ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda said in a message in the report. "That means, more than ever, we need to work together both globally and regionally to find solutions—however gradually implemented—that will bring about a workable reform of the global reserve system."

There is no single alternative to the US dollar as the world's reserve currency. The Greek debt crisis has exposed the euro's lack of a solid sovereign backbone. The yen is Asia's most internationally accepted currency but its reserve status has declined recently. The yuan, the currency of the fast expanding economy of the People's Republic of China, may well become a reserve currency sooner than most anticipate but for now, cannot fill the role.

The report is the result of an ADB-financed study by 17 internationally renowned monetary experts led by Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute and ADB Chief Economist Jong-Wha Lee. It describes the strengths and weaknesses of the current system, the case for cooperation in bringing about reform, and the increasing role Asia must play in making this happen.

Reforming the global reserve system has huge implications for Asia. The region holds close to half of the world's total foreign exchange reserves and is highly dependent on international trade and capital flows for its growing prosperity.

"The dollar-based reserve system has been fraying for years," said Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate and a contributor to the report. "A new global reserve system is absolutely essential if we are to restore the global economy to sustained prosperity and stability. But achieving this is not easy."

The report recommends that with Asia’s growing economic clout, the region should increase economic integration and policy coordination to smooth the transition to a multi-currency reserve system.

Exchange rate and monetary policy coordination needs to be stepped up and there need to be formal mechanisms for economic consultation and surveillance between regional and global institutions. Regional foreign exchange reserves must be more actively deployed through swap lines, special drawing rights and other types of borrowing so there is no repeat of the recent credit crunch.

The report also suggested that given the failure to develop globally binding agreements on climate change, a portion of the revenue that a country receives through seignorage could be used to help their region tackle climate change. Seignorage refers to the profits resulting from the difference in cost of printing money and the face value of the money.

On a global level, the report recommends a stronger set of capital market rules be devised given the failure of the financial system to police itself, and regularly gathering international monetary experts to discuss current account imbalances and thus avoid unnecessary friction between countries on issues such as trade or varying exchange rate regimes.

About ADB

McChrystal's exit: volcanic intervention

How Eyjafjallajokull - and the subsequent grounding of planes - helped blow General's career out of the water

guardian.co.uk, Chris McGreal in Washington, Wednesday 23 June 2010 22.51 BST

The Rolling Stone article that ended McChrystal’s distinguished military career. Photograph: AP

Blame the volcano. What should have been a routine chat with a journalist turned into a fiasco for General Stanley McChrystal after Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano blew its top.

Michael Hastings, the Rolling Stone reporter who wrote the article that blew McChrystal's career out of the water had been scheduled to interview the general in Paris, fly with him to Kabul and then follow him around Afghanistan a bit. But the military intended to control access.

Then Eyjafjallajokull struck, grounding planes in much of Europe, delaying McChrystal and his entourage in Paris and forcing them to take a bus to Berlin. Hastings became part of the mix.

In that time, Hastings got to know the general and his entourage better than he might have expected. The chatted, they drank, they let their guard down and said just what they thought.

"They couldn't fly, so they had to take a bus," Rolling Stone's editor Eric Bates told MSNBC.

"So we really spent a lot of time with him and really got to look behind the curtain, and hear how he and his men, top men, talk among themselves on their own."

McChrystal and his team came to regard Hastings as a member of the team not a pair of alien eyes and ears.

That included getting drunk together in a faux Irish pub as the group who called themselves Team America sang a song they made up which appears to principally contain one word: Afghanistan.

It's not a song McChrystal will be singing in Kabul anymore.

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Afghanistan president backs Petraeus as NATO commander

Radio Netherlands Worldwide, 23 June 2010 - 9:01pm

President Hamid Karzai's government said Wednesday it was "looking forward" to working with the new head of NATO forces in Afghanistan despite warning earlier against changing commanders.

War hero General David Petraeus takes over from General Stanley McChrystal, who resigned at the White House over disparaging remarks he made about top officials in President Barack Obama's administration in a magazine interview.

"Since it was a US government internal decision we respect it. His replacement General David Petraeus is someone who knows Afghanistan, who knows the region very well and is an experienced general," Karzai's spokesman Waheed Omar told AFP.

"We are looking forward to working with him," he added.

Earlier in the day the spokesman said Karzai -- whose relations with the White House have also been troubled -- was confident in the commander and replacing him "would not be helpful" at a critical point in the nine-year war.

"We'd hoped that it would not happen because General McChrystal was a great partner of the Afghan government and a trusted partner of the Afghan people," Omar said.

In a NATO forces statement, McChrystal said he had submitted his resignation to Obama and that it had "been my privilege and honor to lead our nation’s finest".

"I strongly support the president’s strategy in Afghanistan and am deeply committed to our coalition forces, our partner nations, and the Afghan people," he said.

"It was out of respect for this commitment -- and a desire to see the mission succeed -- that I tendered my resignation," McChrystal said.

Earlier, spokesman Omar said Kabul believed the general had made a mistake but it should not detract from the urgency of trying to bring peace and stability to Afghanistan, where McChrystal oversaw about 142,000 troops.

"We agree this was a mistake, we also agree that we're all prone to make mistakes. In the past nine years there have mistakes made in Afghanistan.

"But for the continuation of the process in Afghanistan and the critical time that we've ahead -- his presence is going to be greatly important."

He had suggested that if McChrystal were removed, his departure could interrupt counter-insurgency efforts in Afghanistan crafted under his command.

"We hope that for the sake of moving the process forward smoothly and not interrupting the process, that there's not a change of leadership in the international forces here in Afghanistan," he said.

Karzai himself faced criticism this month over sacking his intelligence chief and interior minister -- two of Afghanistan's top security officials and admired in the West -- after a rocket attack on a landmark peace meeting.

But the presidency credited McChrystal with helping to "increase the level of trust" with the Afghan people since he assumed command last year.

Karzai and Obama have endured months of discord and worsening relations, but made an effort to present a united front during the Afghan leader's last visit to Washington on May 12.

Last December, Obama announced he was sending an extra 30,000 soldiers to Afghanistan in an effort to regain the upper hand against the Taliban, but said he would being withdrawing troops from the country in mid-2011.

Afghan defence ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi had also stepped behind McChrystal, saying there had been great improvements since the general took command of NATO's International Security Assistance Force.

"There have been enormous changes in different areas and these changes have been very important and positive," Azimi told a news conference.

Azimi noted civilian deaths had decreased while coordination between Afghan and NATO troops had improved, while the general's counter-insurgency strategy opened the door to reconstruction, development and governance efforts.

"These are the things that we didn't have with other NATO commanders in the past," Azimi said.

The top US military commander in Afghanistan is removed from his post after his criticism of leading Obama administration officials.

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