Child labor, war or pesticides for your Valentine?

There was a time, long ago, when a lover would buy diamonds, chocolate or roses for his beloved on Valentine's Day with a clear conscience. But life has become more complicated, says Diane Bartz in an article for Reuters news service.
"For some," says Bartz, "the romance is being overshadowed by concerns that the diamonds may have financed wars, that the cacao beans were harvested by children and that the roses were kept perfect with mists of pesticides."

Archbishop of Canterbury sparks Sharia law row in Britain- February 2008

Leading British politicians have distanced themselves from the Archbishop of Canterbury's belief that some Sharia law in the UK seems “unavoidable”. According to a BBC story, Gordon Brown's spokesman said the prime minister “believes that British laws should be based on British values”. The Tories [Conservatives) called the archbishop's remarks “unhelpful” and the Lib Dems said all must abide by the rule of law.

The Islamists' Best Friend at the UN

11/02 Front Page Magazine | Louise Arbour, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, will be presiding over Durban II - the UN's 2009 follow-up to its controversial 2001 ‘anti-racism’ hatefest in Durban, South Africa.

While Canada, her home country, announced that it will not attend the Durban II Conference "circus of intolerance," as Canada’s Secretary of State for Multiculturalism so aptly described it, Ms. Arbour will be the Secretary-General of this circus.

Arbour showed her true colors a couple of weeks ago when she went out of her way to endorse a new pan-Arab human rights charter that includes a commitment to eliminate Zionism, which it explicitly equates with racism.   In the preamble to the Arab charter that she sought fit to unabashedly praise, the charter speaks of "rejecting all forms of racism and Zionism," while Article 2  says that "racism, Zionism and foreign occupation and domination" should be "condemned and efforts must be deployed for their elimination." Apparently Arbour forgot that even the UN General Assembly had voted to repeal its infamous 1975 ‘Zionism equals racism’ resolution.  Only after UN Watch asked her office for a clarification of her original remarks that had omitted any reference to this repeal did Arbour backtrack somewhat

UK: Multiple wives will mean multiple benefits

UK: A deafening silence that betrays our values

05/02 Telegraph.co.uk | Four weeks ago, the Bishop of Rochester, Michael Nazir-Ali, expressed on these pages his concern at the lack of integration into British society of some Muslim communities living here. He has since received an enormous amount of support from private individuals for his remarks - as well as death threats from fanatics who said they would kill him unless he stopped criticising the religion of Islam (something which he insisted he was not doing).

The most striking aspect of the response to his article, however, has not been that bigoted and offensive reaction from a small number: it has been the almost complete silence from the Government on the issues he raised.