Six In The Morning

After decades under Gaddafi, Libyans begin to embrace the political process

　

By Tara Bahrampour
On a muggy evening in Tripoli’s walled Old City, Joma el-Shwehdi gleefully slapped campaign posters on the sides of buildings. What was the platform of the man he was supporting? What promises had the candidate made ahead of Saturday’s national assembly election? Shwehdi shrugged. “I don’t know anything about that,” the lanky 24-year-old said as he smoothed a poster on the side of a stucco clock tower. “He’s a friend, and he lives near me, so I support him.” After a politically stagnant 42 years during which the only leadership option was Moammar Gaddafi and the only ideology was his Green Book, Libyans are dazzled, if a little befuddled, by the array of posters, pamphlets, radio commercials and even hot-air balloons festooning their cities and towns in the run-up to their first national election in nearly half a century.

Big pharma is cut out by India's plan to bring medicine to masses
Ambitious $5bn push deals blow to global firms with focus on generic alternatives above branded drugs

Friday 06 July 2012
India is planning a multibillion-dollar push to bring free medicines to the hundreds of millions of its citizens who, despite the country's economic revival, still languish without access to the very basics of health care. The $5bn initiative, which is slated to be rolled out by the end of this year, will offer 348 essential drugs to patients across the country. In a blow to the West's big pharmaceutical firms, the planned scheme will largely cut out branded drugs, opting instead for cheaper generic alternatives.

Romanian MPs move to impeach president
The Irish Times - Friday, July 6, 2012

DANIEL McLAUGHLIN
ROMANIAN PRESIDENT Traian Basescu faces an impeachment vote in parliament today, in the latest round of a fierce power struggle with prime minister Victor Ponta that has alarmed the European Union and United States and fuelled fears for the country’s democracy. Deputies loyal to Mr Ponta’s two-month-old, left-leaning government yesterday presented their case for suspending Mr Basescu, accusing him of interfering with the judiciary and exceeding his powers by announcing tough austerity measures in 2010 as part of an international bailout.

Africa's Growing Middle Class Drives Development
Africa's growing middle class is fueling development across the continent. Ambitious entrepreneurs are creating growth with companies focusing on everything from fashion to pharmaceuticals. But poor infrastructure, corruption and political conflict are hampering their efforts.

By Horand Knaup and Jan Puhl
Sylvia Owori is examining the photos for the summer collection, but she isn't satisfied. "Much too much oil on the skin," she says, pointing to a young woman. "We want to show off the dress, not her legs." A click of the mouse, and the candidate is out of the running. A new girl appears on the screen. She is wearing a yellow miniskirt, as she poses against a pale and misty backdrop of Lake Victoria. "This one is good," says Owori, to an audible sigh of relief in her studio in the Ugandan capital Kampala. The photographers, designers and seamstresses surrounding her are relieved.

Hermits no more, and not for turning
Korea

By John Feffer
If North Koreans simply knew more about the world outside - or received more accurate information about their own society - they would transform their country. This is an operating assumption behind much of the policy thinking in Washington and Seoul. Both governments pour money into radio stations that beam information into North Korea. Civil society activists, perhaps impatient with the incremental pace of government policy, try to get information into the notoriously isolated country by any means possible, from floating balloons over the border to crossing into the country to proselytize in person. When the first North Korean defectors began to trickle out of the country, they were astonished to learn about the world outside. The first North Koreans to go to China during the famine years of the mid-1990s couldn't believe that the communist neighbor they'd always considered economically backward had cutting-edge technology, bustling markets, and affluent consumers.

Argentina's Videla and Bignone guilty of baby theft
Two former leaders during Argentina's military rule have been found guilty of overseeing the systematic theft of babies from political prisoners.

The BBC 6 July 2012
A court in Buenos Aires sentenced Jorge Videla to 50 years in prison and Reynaldo Bignone to 15 years. They are already serving lengthy jail sentences for crimes committed under military rule, between 1976 and 1983. At least 400 babies are thought to have been taken from their parents while they were held in detention centres. The verdict is the culmination of a trial that began in February 2011. In total, 11 people, most of them former military and police officials, were facing charges.