Report of the U.S. Higher Education Leaders Mission To Indonesia

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USINDO






FOR RELEASE: IMMEDIATE July 26, 2010




CONTACT:

Alysson Oakley, U.S.-Indonesia Society, 202-232-1400 or aoakley@usindo.org

Sharon Witherell, Institute of International Education, 212-984-5380 or switherell@iie.org

Derek Ferrar East-West Center, 808-944-7204 or ferrard@eastwestcenter.org

Paul F. Hassen, APLU, 202-478-6073 or phassen@aplu.org
Washington, DC, July 26, 2010 – Four U.S. non-governmental organizations today call for a “comprehensive re-invigoration” of the U.S.-Indonesia relationship in higher education in 2010 through the combined efforts of the two countries’ public, private, university and NGO sectors.

The call to action is contained in the document, Report of the U.S. Higher Education Leaders Mission To Indonesia: Recommendations on U.S.-Indonesia Enhanced Cooperation In Higher Education Under The Planned “Comprehensive Partnership.” The report was issued today by the United States-Indonesia Society (USINDO), the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (A۰P۰L۰U), the Institute of International Education (IIE), and the East-West Center.

In the report, the four organizations say 2010 offers the best chance there will ever be for a major United States-Indonesia bilateral initiative on education. The organizations call for a systematic and collaborative public and private effort to:

• enhance the quality, volume, and diversity of exchanges of students, faculty, and researchers, including doubling the number of Indonesians studying in the United States, and tripling the number of Americans studying in Indonesia;

• strengthen the capacity of Indonesian institutions to improve educational performance, educate Indonesians to an international standard, and attract American students and faculty in new fields of study;

• significantly expand U.S.-Indonesian institutional partnerships, including research partnerships in areas of global significance and shared concern;

• build the capacity of American institutions to teach Americans about Indonesia, participate in study and research on Indonesia, and receive Indonesian students;

• work with Indonesia to facilitate U.S. investment in strengthening Indonesia’s education sector.

To address these goals, the report calls for the formation of a “Joint U.S.-Indonesia Council on Higher Education Partnership.” The Council will engage the energies and resources of the private sector, private and public universities, foundations, and the NGO community in each country, in cooperation with the two governments.

“To make progress on such a far-reaching program over the next several years will require the combined energies and resources of governments, universities, foundations, corporations and committed individuals in each country,” said Ambassador David Merrill, president of the U.S.-Indonesia Society (USINDO). “Our organizations look forward to playing an active role in contributing to a deep and robust U.S.-Indonesian bilateral educational partnership.”

The report was based on the findings of the July 2009 U.S. Higher Education Leaders Mission to Indonesia to explore opportunities for expanding higher education programs under the planned U.S.-Indonesia Comprehensive Partnership. The Higher Education Leader’s Mission was led by four co-chairs representing non-governmental parties involved in the U.S-Indonesia higher educational relationship: Gregory L. Geoffroy, president of Iowa State University and representative of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (A۰P۰L۰U); Allan Goodman, president and CEO of the Institute of International Education; Ambassador David Merrill, president of the United States-Indonesia Society (USINDO), and Charles E. Morrison, president of the East-West Center.

For a full copy of the press release and a list of the delegation, click here.

For a PDF of report, please click here.


The United States-Indonesia Society (www.usindo.org) is dedicated to expanding understanding of Indonesia and of the importance of the United States-Indonesia relationship. As the world's third largest democracy and the fourth most populous country, Indonesia is one of the United States' most important partners on trade and security issues. The mission of the United States-Indonesia Society (USINDO) is to expand mutual understanding in the areas of politics, economics, history, culture, and the importance of the bilateral relationship, through work with leaders in government and nongovernmental organizations, educators, the media, business, and the general public.

The Institute of International Education (www.iie.org), an independent, nonprofit organization founded in 1919, is the world’s most experienced global higher education and professional exchange organization. IIE has a network of 18 offices worldwide, more than 1,000 college and university members, and more than 5,000 volunteers. IIE designs and implements programs of study and training for students, educators, young professionals and trainees from all sectors with funding from government and private sources. These programs include the Fulbright and Humphrey Fellowships and the Gilman Scholarships administered for the U.S. Department of State.

East-West Center (www.EastWestCenter.org) is an education and research organization established by the U.S. Congress in 1960 to strengthen relations and understanding among the peoples and nations of Asia, the Pacific, and the United States. The Center contributes to a peaceful, prosperous, and just Asia Pacific community by serving as a vigorous hub for cooperative research, education, and dialogue on critical issues of common concern to the Asia Pacific region and the United States. Funding for the Center comes from the U.S. government, with additional support provided by private agencies, individuals, foundations, corporations, and the governments of the region.

Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (www.aplu.org) is an association of public research universities, land-grant institutions, and state university systems, founding in 1887. A۰P۰L۰U member campuses enroll more than 3.5 million undergraduate and 1.1 million graduate students, employ more than 645,000 faculty members, and conduct nearly two-thirds of all academic research, totaling more than $34 billion annually. As the nation’s oldest higher education association, A۰P۰L۰U is dedicated to excellence in learning, discovery and engagement.

Oil Companies Fueling Nuclear Proliferation in Burma Complicit in Targeted Killings and Forced Labor | EarthRights International

The Yadana Pipeline

ERI has been documenting earth rights abuses along the Yadana Pipeline since 1994. Our latest reports were published in September, 2009.

Background of the Yadana Pipeline

Yadana Pipeline Villager Testimonials (Video)

Press Coverage: Chevron and the Yadana Pipeline

Yadana Pipeline Region Map

Sun, 07/04/2010 - 22:13

• Burma Project

EarthRights International released an explosive new report Energy Insecurity: How Total, Chevron, and PTTEP Contribute to Human Rights Violations, Financial Secrecy, and Nuclear Proliferation in Burma (Myanmar) on July 5, 2010 in Paris. The report describes how the oil companies Total (France), Chevron (US), and PTTEP (Thailand) have generated over US $9 billion dollars in military-ruled Burma (Myanmar) since 1998, making their Yadana Natural Gas Project the single largest source of revenue for the country’s notoriously repressive dictatorship.

Image by totaloutnow via Flickr

The report documents how over half the total project revenue — nearly $5 billion — went directly to the Burmese military junta, and examines recent refusals from the Yadana companies to disclose their payments to the Burmese military regime. The report alleges the funds have enabled the country’s autocratic junta to maintain power and pursue an expensive, illegal nuclear weapons program while participating in illicit weapons trade in collaboration with North Korea, threatening the domestic and regional security balance.

In the report, EarthRights International further asserts that gas revenues are stored in private offshore bank accounts, where the money “could be used for many purposes, including the illicit acquisition of nuclear technology and ballistic weaponry.” This follows a report by ERI in 2009 that exposed two offshore banks in Singapore as repositories of the Burmese generals’ ill-gotten gains from foreign investment including the gas project. Both named banks – the Overseas Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC) and DBS Group – previously denied the allegations.

The report also reveals on-going, serious human rights abuses associated with the Yadana project, including the recent extra-judicial killing of two ethnic Mon villagers in the pipeline area confirmed by EarthRights International in February of this year. The report goes on to analyzes how both Total and Chevron remain liable for these and other serious human rights abuse in their home countries.

EarthRights International previously sued Unocal Corporation (now Chevron) for complicity in murder, rape, torture, and forced labor in connection to the same gas pipeline. In 2005, Unocal paid Burmese plaintiffs a confidential settlement before the company was acquired by Chevron.

• Energy Insecurity (Full Report, English)
• Executive Summary & Recommendations (French)
• Press Release
• Media Advisory)

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New Report Documents 10 Years of Anti-Homeless Violence

Source: National Coalition for the Homeless

Today the National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH) released the 2008 numbers of hate crimes and violent attacks against people experiencing homelessness. The numbers are from a new report entitled Hate, Violence, And Death on Main Street USA, 2008.

Key findings include:

• The total number of attacks for 2008: 106.
• The number of fatal attacks is the second highest since 2001: 27 deaths.
• 73 percent of the attacks were committed by individuals who were ages 25 and younger.
• Florida ranked #1 for the fourth year in a row for most attacks, California was second.

“Those experiencing homelessness are often ignored or misunderstood by society. If these brutal attacks were committed against any other religious or minority group to the same degree, there would be a national outcry and call for governmental action,” said Michael Stoops, executive director of NCH. “We must respond to this dehumanization and protect homeless persons against hate crimes and violence.”

The 42 percent of homeless people who are unsheltered are the most vulnerable to these attacks. Because crimes committed against homeless persons often go unreported, the actual numbers of non-lethal attacks may be much higher. While the motive for an attack is often unclear, some of the attackers said they committed the crime out of “boredom,” or for a “thrill” or “fun.”

+ Full Report

India: Overhaul Abusive, Failing Police System

August 4, 2009

Mumbai police officers stand on a roughly made watchtower near the Gateway of India monument on New Year’s Eve, 2008.

Broken System

Related videos:

• To Protect & Serve: Police Brutality in India

India is modernizing rapidly, but the police continue to use their old methods: abuse and threats. It’s time for the government to stop talking about reform and fix the system.

Brad Adams, Asia director

(Bangalore) - The Indian government should take major steps to overhaul a policing system that facilitates and even encourages human rights violations, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. For decades, successive governments have failed to deliver on promises to hold the police accountable for abuses and to build professional, rights-respecting police forces.

The 118-page report, "Broken System: Dysfunction, Abuse and Impunity in the Indian Police," documents a range of human rights violations committed by police, including arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and extrajudicial killings. The report is based on interviews with more than 80 police officers of varying ranks, 60 victims of police abuses, and numerous discussions with experts and civil society activists. It documents the failings of state police forces that operate outside the law, lack sufficient ethical and professional standards, are overstretched and outmatched by criminal elements, and unable to cope with increasing demands and public expectations. Field research was conducted in 19 police stations in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, and the capital, Delhi.

"India is modernizing rapidly, but the police continue to use their old methods: abuse and threats," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "It's time for the government to stop talking about reform and fix the system."

A fruit vendor in Varanasi described how police tortured him to extract confessions to multiple, unrelated false charges:

"[M]y hands and legs were tied; a wooden stick was passed through my legs. They started beating me badly on the legs with lathis (batons) and kicking me. They were saying, ‘You must name all the members of the 13-person gang.' They beat me until I was crying and shouting for help. When I was almost fainting, they stopped the beating. A constable said, ‘With this kind of a beating, a ghost would run away. Why won't you tell me what I want to know?' Then they turned me upside down... They poured water from a plastic jug into my mouth and nose, and I fainted."

Read additional accounts from victims of police abuse.

Several police officers admitted to Human Rights Watch that they routinely committed abuses. One officer said that he had been ordered to commit an "encounter killing," as the practice of taking into custody and extra-judicially executing an individual is commonly known. "I am looking for my target," the officer said. "I will eliminate him. ... I fear being put in jail, but if I don't do it, I'll lose my position."

Almost every police officer interviewed by Human Rights Watch was aware of the boundaries of the law, but many believed that unlawful methods, including illegal detention and torture, were necessary tactics of crime investigation and law enforcement.

The Indian government elected in May has promised to pursue police reforms actively. Human Rights Watch said that a critical step is to ensure that police officers who commit human rights violations, regardless of rank, will face appropriate punishment.

"Police who commit or order torture and other abuses need to be treated as the criminals they are," said Adams. "There shouldn't be one standard for police who violate the law and another for average citizens."

Human Rights Watch also said that while not excusing abuses, abysmal conditions for police officers contribute to violations. Low-ranking officers often work in difficult conditions. They are required to be on-call 24 hours a day, every day. Instead of shifts, many work long hours, sometimes living in tents or filthy barracks at the police station. Many are separated from their families for long stretches of time. They often lack necessary equipment, including vehicles, mobile phones, investigative tools and even paper on which to record complaints and make notes.

Police officers told Human Rights Watch that they used "short-cuts" to cope with overwhelming workloads and insufficient resources. For instance, they described how they or others cut caseloads by refusing to register crime complaints. Many officers described facing unrealistic pressure from their superiors to solve cases quickly. Receiving little or no encouragement to collect forensic evidence and witness statements, tactics considered time-consuming, they instead held suspects illegally and coerced them to confess, frequently using torture and ill-treatment.

"Conditions and incentives for police officers need to change," Adams said. "Officers should not be put into a position where they think they have to turn to abuse to meet superiors' demands, or obey orders to abuse. Instead they should be given the resources, training, equipment, and encouragement to act professionally and ethically."

"Broken System" also documents the particular vulnerability to police abuse of traditionally marginalized groups in India. They include the poor, women, Dalits (so-called "untouchables"), and religious and sexual minorities. Police often fail to investigate crimes against them because of discrimination, the victims' inability to pay bribes, or their lack of social status or political connections. Members of these groups are also more vulnerable to arbitrary arrest and torture, especially meted out by police as punishment for alleged crimes.

Colonial-era police laws enable state and local politicians to interfere routinely in police operations, sometimes directing police officers to drop investigations against people with political connections, including known criminals, and to harass or file false charges against political opponents. These practices corrode public confidence.

In 2006, a landmark Supreme Court judgment mandated reform of police laws. But the central government and most state governments have either significantly or completely failed to implement the court's order, suggesting that officials have yet to accept the urgency of comprehensive police reform, including the need to hold police accountable for human rights violations.

"India's status as the world's largest democracy is undermined by a police force that thinks it is above the law," said Adams. "It's a vicious cycle. Indians avoid contact with the police out of fear. So crimes go unreported and unpunished, and the police can't get the cooperation they need from the public to prevent and solve crimes."

"Broken System" sets out detailed recommendations for police reform drawn from studies by government commissions, former Indian police, and Indian groups. Among the major recommendations are:

• Require the police to read suspects their rights upon arrest or any detention, which will increase institutional acceptance of these safeguards;
• Exclude from court any evidence police obtain by using torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in suspect interrogations;
• Bolster independent investigations into complaints of police abuse and misconduct through national and state human rights commissions and police complaints authorities; and
• Improve training and equipment, including strengthening the crime-investigation curriculum at police academies, training low-ranking officers to assist in crime investigations, and providing basic forensic equipment to every police officer.

Selected Accounts from ‘Broken System'

"She was kept in the police station all night. In the morning, when we went to meet her, they said she had killed herself. They showed us her body, where she was hanging from a tree inside the police station. The branch was so low, it is impossible that she hanged herself from it. Her feet were clean, although there was wet mud all around and she would have walked through it to reach the tree. It is obvious that the police killed her and then pretended she had committed suicide."

- Brother-in-law of Gita Pasi, describing her death in police custody in Uttar Pradesh in August 2006

"We have no time to think, no time to sleep. I tell my men that a victim will only come to the police station because we can give him justice, so we should not beat him with a stick. But often the men are tired and irritable and mistakes take place."

- Gangaram Azad, a sub-inspector who heads a rural police station in Uttar Pradesh state

"They say, ‘investigate within 24 hours,' but they never care about how I will do [that]; what are the resources. ... There is use of force in sensational cases because we are not equipped with scientific methods. What remains with us? A sense of panic surrounds our mind that if we don't come to a conclusion we will be suspended or face punishment. We are bound to fulfill the case, we must cover the facts in any way."

- Subinspector working near Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh

"Often, it is our superiors who ask us to do wrong things. It is hard for us to resist. I remember, one time, my officer had asked me to beat up someone. I said that the man would be refused bail and would rot in jail and that was enough punishment. But that made my officer angry."

- Constable in Uttar Pradesh

"With all the mental stress, the 24-hour law-and-order duty, the political pressure, a person may turn to violence. How much can a person take? ... We have to keep watch on an accused person, their human rights, but what about us? Living like this 24 hours. We are not claiming that our power makes us born to work all the times. Sometimes we beat or detain illegally, because our working conditions, our facilities are bad. So we are contributing to creating criminals, militants."

- Inspector in charge of a police station in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh

Tracking Development and Governance in the Pacific 2009

The second annual Tracking development and governance in the Pacific report has found that the Pacific region is seriously off track to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015.

The report monitors progress towards the MDGs in the region and assesses the performance of Pacific island countries and development partners. The report focuses on the Pacific island countries of Cook Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), Fiji, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, PNG, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. It includes Timor-Leste—in this case as a reference country—because it shares many characteristics of Pacific countries.

While some countries in the Pacific have made good progress against, and even achieved some MDG targets, the same cannot be said of the entire region.

Solomon Islands and Vanuatu have more than halved their rates of malaria infection between 2003 and 2008 showing that quick development gains are possible with strong commitments from government and development partners.

However, around 400,000 children across the region are still not making it into a primary school. Around 64 out of every 1,000 children in the region are still dying before the age of five. This is despite significant investments by development partners.

The report concludes that a new development framework is required to ensure the Pacific keeps pace with better international development practice. Transparent and accountable use of all development resources is necessary to increase progress towards the MDGs. Clear and measurable commitments are required to improve coordination and accelerate progress towards mutually agreed development outcomes.

The Pacific Partnerships for Development commit Australia and Pacific island countries to work together to address these challenges.

More information:

Report: Tracking Development and Governance in the Pacific 2009

Speech: The Role of Foreign Aid in Responding to the Economic Crisis in the Pacific Islands Region

Media Release: Tracking Development and Governance in the Pacific

Opening Their Wallets, Emptying Their Savings

By Blaine Harden
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, July 30, 2009

SEOUL -- In pursuit of middle-class prosperity, South Koreans have looted their household savings like no other people on Earth.

They have collectively binged on private schools and fancy cars, language camps and new apartments, foreign travel and designer shoes.

Americans, the longtime avatars of consumerism gone mad, will save next year at double the rate of South Koreans, according to a report this month from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a group that supports sustainable economic growth in developed countries.

When it comes to buying high-priced, brand-name stuff as if there were no tomorrow, Sabina Vaughan concludes that Americans are relative wimps. "Koreans spend more, way more," said Vaughan, 35, who travels to Seoul every summer with her Korean-born mother and spies on her cousins as they shop. "It is a kind of competition for them. It doesn't matter what their income is."

Her conclusion is supported by a mountain of data and a chorus of concerned economists. The household savings rate in South Korea will have plummeted from a world-beating 25.2 percent in 1988 to a projected world low of 3.2 percent in 2010, according to the OECD. Government policies have encouraged borrowing, while Korea's aggressive culture has supercharged spending on signifiers of success, whether they be Ivy League degrees or Louis Vuitton handbags.

"It is not recognized as a virtue to save, not anymore," said Lee Sun-uk, an investment adviser for an office of Samsung Securities that is located in a wealthy neighborhood of Seoul. "To maintain a certain status, people are willing to spend, even if their incomes have declined."

In the past decade, average savings per household have plunged from about $3,300 to $525. On a percentage basis, it is the steepest savings decline in the developed world. Meanwhile, household debt as a percentage of individual disposable income has risen to 140 percent, higher than in the United States (136 percent), according to the Bank of Korea.

The consequences of South Korea's collapsed savings rate are beginning to register in the country's slowing rate of growth, economists said. For nearly 40 years, growth galloped along at between 6 and 8 percent, as banks were flush with household savings that fueled business investment and research. But growth slowed to about 4.5 percent after 2000, when the savings rate dipped below 10 percent.

"The low savings rate is sapping our capacity to grow, and it is going to get worse," said Park Deog-bae, a research fellow who specializes in household finance at the Hyundai Research Institute. "It will lead to credit delinquency. It will cause greater income disparity. It means less resources for our aging population."

As South Korea changed from a war-battered farming society to Asia's fourth-largest economy, its savings rate was almost certain to decline. Economists consider a fall in savings and a rise in consumer spending to be part of the normal development process, as government-backed social services increase, property values rise, and stock markets grow.

But the fall-off-a-cliff character of what has happened with household savings in South Korea strikes many experts as abnormal and worrisome. It is one of several trends suggesting that South Korea, as it wrestles with post-industrial affluence, is a society under extraordinary stress.

South Koreans work more, sleep less and kill themselves at a higher rate than citizens of any other developed country, according to the OECD. They rank first in time spent online and second to last in spending on recreation, and the per capita birthrate scrapes the bottom of world rankings. By 2050, South Korea will be the most aged society in the world, narrowly edging out Japan, according to the OECD.

At the same time, South Korea ranks first in per capita spending on private education, which includes home tutors, cram sessions and English-language courses at home and abroad.

An obsessive pursuit of educational achievement, it seems, is one of the driving forces behind the low savings rate. About 80 percent of all students from elementary age to high school attend after-school cram courses. About 6 percent of the country's gross domestic product is spent on education, more than double the percentage of spending in the United States, Japan or Britain.

"Education is a fixed expenditure for Korean parents, even when household income shrinks," said Oh Moon-suk, executive director at LG Economic Research Institute. "Parents often overspend. It even appears to be leading to a slowdown in the birthrate."

As she plans her family's monthly spending, Lim Ji-young says she makes sure that at least a third of the money is reserved for the education of her 5-year-old son, Roah.

Besides day-care fees, he requires money for books, alphabet tutoring and sports training.

"We want to give our son the opportunity not to be left behind in this society," said Lim, 34, an office administrator in Seoul. "We want to provide him with what other people are providing. To avoid condescension from other people, you want to have the best."

Competitive spending -- on tutors, apartments, imported whiskey and designer handbags -- is a significant factor in the decline of saving in South Korean, according to Park at Hyundai Research.

"Koreans are so much concerned about saving face," Park said. "This is encouraging overspending and it is sometimes irrational."

There are other reasons for the fall in savings that are eminently rational -- and sponsored by the government.

When the economy nearly collapsed a decade ago during the Asian financial crisis, the government made low-cost loans available for the purchase of apartments.

Borrowing exploded, as did housing values, while savings began to evaporate.

"Young households without proper discipline borrowed heavily from banks and on credit cards," said Lee Doo-won, a professor of economics at Yonsei University in Seoul. "They ended up with a huge amount of debt, and the debt trap is still there."

Stagnant incomes and job losses in the current recession have further reduced capacity for savings and have slowed debt repayment.

As important, the spending patterns of aging parents, many of whom have been tapped for loans by children in pursuit of real estate, mean that cash is steadily disappearing from savings accounts.

"Old people do not save," Lee said. "This is a long-term structural phenomenon. It will not change with the business cycle."

Special correspondent Stella Kim contributed to this report.

Education in Indonesia

Investing in Indonesia's Education Download the main report Policy Research Working Paper Executive Summary (Bahasa) Teacher employment and deployment in Indonesia Download Early childhood education and development in Indonesia : an investment for a better life Download » More Related Reports The World Bank has signed an agreement with the Government of the Kingdom of the Netherlands on the provision of $ 20 million to help the Ministry of National Education maximize the effectiveness of the BOS (Bantuan Operasional Sekolah or School Operational Assistance) Program. The Dutch grant, which will be administered by the World Bank, will be used to ensure that BOS funds to schools are well used, and parents are better informed about the BOS program. Read more

QUICKFACTS

Indicators in Indonesia (Figures show the most recent available data and the year)

For more recent data see World Bank Education Stat (EdStat)

Health in Indonesia

Health Financing in Indonesia: A Reform Road Map Download the main report Press Release Indonesia’s Doctors, Midwives and Nurses: Current Stock, Increasing Needs, Future Challenges and Options Download Investing in Indonesia's Health Download » More Related Reports Indonesia is facing major policy challenges in terms of how health reform will be financed, which groups should be subsidized, what specific health benefits should be covered, what changes are needed in the service delivery system, as well as other regulatory and administrative issues. The latest World Bank Report on health addresses these issues. Read more

QUICKFACTS

Indicators in Indonesia (Figures show the most recent available data and the year)

For Full Data on Health and Population in Indonesia click here

The Sentencing Project Releases National Report: 1 in 11 Prisoners Serving Life Sentences

Source: The Sentencing Project

A new report released by The Sentencing Project finds a record 140,610 individuals are now serving life sentences in state and federal prisons, 6,807 of whom were juveniles at the time of the crime. In addition, 29% of persons serving a life sentence (41,095) have no possibility of parole, and 1,755 were juveniles at the time of the crime. No Exit: The Expanding Use of Life Sentences in America represents the first nationwide collection of life sentence data documenting race, ethnicity and gender. The report’s findings reveal overwhelming racial and ethnic disparities in the allocation of life sentences: 66% of all persons sentenced to life are non-white, and 77% of juveniles serving life sentences are non-white.

+ Full Report (PDF; 1.2 MB)

Data Security and the Worry-Free Traveler

Data Security and the Worry-Free Traveler (PDF; 483 KB)
Source: Kroll Fraud Solutions

It seems Americans have given up on the true getaway vacation. According to a recent study by Expedia, Americans receive – and use – less vacation time than their European counterparts. And for those who do get away, many often take the office with them on the road. We simply can’t unplug. Unfortunately, data breaches and identity theft don’t take holidays either. Given that the loss of a laptop, thumb drive, or even a wallet is all too common when traveling … maybe relaxing too much isn’t such a good thing after all.

Shared Hope International’s Report on Child Sexual Slavery in America

Source: Shared Hope

In 2006 Shared Hope International received a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to perform field research on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking (DMST)—the sex trafficking of American children. The National Report is the culmination of ten field assessments conducted in targeted locations in the United States, providing a comprehensive understanding of child sex trafficking across America. This unprecedented report reveals the starling reality that American children are being recruited from our neighborhoods and sold on our streets!

The National Report found misidentification of victims to be the primary barrier to properly addressing America’s trafficked children. Consequently, this misidentification often leads to the criminalization of victims, barring them from receiving proper treatment and care. In fact, in nearly every location American child victims of sex trafficking are being arrested for the crime committed against them while their abusers walk free. In addition, the study found a severe lack of appropriate protective and therapeutic shelters. Finally, the National Report emphasizes that although buyers are a critical in addressing the issue of child sex trafficking, buyers most often escape criminalization.

+ Full Report (PDF; 1.3 MB)

U.S. Overlooks Kyrgyzstan Rights Abuses

By CLIFFORD J. LEVY

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan — “You know what this is for,” Emilbek Kaptagaev recalled being told by the police officers who snatched him off the street. No other words, just blows to the head, then all went black. Mr. Kaptagaev, an opponent of Kyrgyzstan’s president, who is a vital American ally in the war in nearby Afghanistan, was found later in a field with a concussion, broken ribs and a face swollen into a mosaic of bruises.

Mr. Kaptagaev said that the beating last month was a warning to stop campaigning against the president, but that he would not. And so he received an anonymous call only a few days ago. “Have you forgotten?” the voice growled. “Want it to happen again?”

Mr. Kaptagaev’s story is not unusual in this poor former Soviet republic in the mountains of Central Asia. Many opposition politicians and independent journalists have been arrested, prosecuted, attacked and even killed over the last year as the Kyrgyz president, Kurmanbek Bakiyev, has consolidated control in advance of elections on Thursday, which he is all but certain to win.

“This is how the authorities rule in Kyrgyzstan,” said Mr. Kaptagaev, 52. “They use criminal methods to keep power.”

The United States has remained largely silent in response to this wave of violence, apparently wary of jeopardizing the status of its sprawling air base, on the outskirts of this capital, which supports the mission in Afghanistan. Indeed, the Obama administration has sought to woo the Kyrgyz president since he said in February that he would close the Manas base.

In June, President Obama sent a letter to Mr. Bakiyev praising his role in Afghanistan and the campaign against terrorism. Mr. Bakiyev allowed the base to stay, after the United States agreed to pay higher rent and other minor changes.

The lack of criticism of Mr. Bakiyev underscores how the Obama administration has emphasized pragmatic concerns over human rights in dealings with autocratic leaders in Central Asia. Under pressure in Afghanistan, the administration has feared alienating nearby countries whose support is increasingly important.

How to react to crackdowns like Mr. Bakiyev’s is a longstanding challenge for American diplomacy, here and around the world. Some American officials stress that rebuking governments over human rights is often ineffective because they lash back, and tighten things further.

The administration is mindful that a neighboring former Soviet republic, Uzbekistan, closed an American military facility there after American officials condemned an attack by the security forces in 2005 that killed hundreds of people. The Obama administration is trying to repair that relationship.

In the Kyrgyz elections on Thursday, opposition parties have rallied around the candidacy of a former prime minister, Almazbek Atambaev, but he is given little chance. Mr. Atambaev’s campaign manager, Bakyt Beshimov, said the Kyrgyz president drew strength from the American reluctance to speak out.

“This regime clearly understand that for the United States, democracy is not a priority, freedom of speech is not a priority,” Mr. Beshimov said. “They want peace, stability, air bases and regional security connected with Afghanistan.”

The Obama administration’s attempt to improve ties with Central Asia was underscored by a visit to the region this month by a senior diplomat, William J. Burns.

In Kyrgyzstan, Mr. Burns said at a news conference that the United States hoped for “fair and credible elections,” but he did not mention the treatment of the opposition or journalists.

Interviewed about the political situation, another State Department official, George A. Krol, said reports of violence “greatly disturb the department.”

“The United States doesn’t shy away from raising these issues with the Kyrgyz authorities,” he said.

The Kyrgyz president, Mr. Bakiyev, took office in 2005 after the Tulip Revolution — the third in what was seen at the time as a series of so-called color revolutions that offered hope of more democratic governments in the former Soviet Union.

Today, widespread disillusionment has set in, as in Ukraine and Georgia, which also had such upheavals.

Kyrgyzstan, with five million people, continues to have a more open political system and more open media than its hard-line neighbors in Central Asia. It is not a police state, and in general, only those who overtly challenge the government are hounded by the security services.

Even so, human rights groups have been taken aback.

“President Bakiyev has become infamous for even greater levels of corruption, authoritarianism and ineffective economic policies than his predecessor,” Freedom House, a human rights group, said in a new report.

In an interview at the presidential residence, Mr. Bakiyev dismissed such criticism. He said the security services were in no way persecuting the opposition.

He said he would be easily re-elected because the country was faring well despite the financial crisis, adding that opposition leaders were complaining that balloting would be falsified because they needed excuses for their lack of support.

“A strong opposition would not behave in that way,” Mr. Bakiyev said.

He said he was so confident that the elections would be honest that he had invited the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to monitor them. In a report in May, the organization, which has 56 member states, described concerns in Kyrgyzstan about “a criminalization of the political process.”

Mr. Bakiyev, asked about repeated attacks on journalists, said he doubted that the attacks were related to their jobs. He said the government would never try to silence the media.

“The only authorities that would take that step are ones who are afraid — afraid of journalists, afraid of openness, afraid of something that they want to hide,” he said. “I, as president, and the government of Kyrgyzstan fear absolutely nothing. There is no motive, there is no reason to hunt down journalists.”

Still, the bloodshed continues. This month, a journalist named Almaz Tashiyev died after being beaten by police officers, prosecutors said.

Syrgak Abdyldaev says he barely escaped that fate. In March, Mr. Abdyldaev, 47, a well-known journalist who has scrutinized the president’s political activities, was lured to a meeting by an anonymous caller who promised confidential information, and was attacked.

He was stabbed 29 times in the thigh, apparently in an effort to cause him to bleed to death. He survived after passers-by came to his aid.

“They wanted to make an example of me,” Mr. Abdyldaev said. “They wanted me to die in front of everybody. And then nobody — not a journalist, not anybody with a brain in his head — would dare write anything in the press.”

While he was hospitalized, his newspaper, The Bishkek Reporter, dismissed him. He was told it was too risky to keep publishing his work.

Kingdom 'Not Free' in 2008

Wednesday, 22 July 2009 14:04 Sebastian Strangio

A REPORT released Thursday by the US-based international watchdog organisation Freedom House rated Cambodia as "not free" and claimed that the government had only "paid lip service" to its stated goals of combating corruption and improving governance.

In its 2009 Freedom in the World report, an annual comparison of global political rights and civil liberties, the organisation said Cambodia had earned its rating due to endemic corruption, free speech restrictions and the lack of an independent judiciary in the Kingdom.

"Cambodia is not an electoral democracy," the report stated.

"Prime Minister Hun Sen and the [Cambodian People's Party] dominate national and local politics through their control of the security forces, officials at all levels of government and the state-owned media."

The report also paints a picture of a judiciary "marred by inefficiency and corruption", and claims corruption and abuse of power by high-ranking government officials have "significantly hindered" economic growth.

"Although the economy has been growing as a result of increased investments ... these enterprises frequently involve land grabs by the political elite, top bureaucrats and the military," the report states.

Each year, Freedom House designates countries as "free", "partly free" or "not free". Except for 1993 and 1994, Freedom House has rated Cambodia as "not free" every year since the report was launched in 1973.

Thun Saray, president of the local rights group Adhoc, said the report generally described the situation in Cambodia accurately, though he said the static "not free" rating did not capture the dynamic of transition the country is still experiencing.

Referring to the recent crackdown on government critics, he said Cambodia was certainly in a period of decline.

But he said history showed a pattern of ups and downs.

"Sometimes we see the political space widen, and sometimes we see it narrow down," he told the Post.

"The improvement is that people are more aware of their rights than ever before."

He added: "In a transitional period there are always struggles between democratic and authoritarian forces, and sometimes the authoritarian forces prevail."

A transitional period
Phay Siphan, spokesman for the Council of Ministers, said he had not seen the Freedom House report, but that Cambodia still faces many challenges.

He said the current government had experienced peace and stability only in the past 11 years, providing a narrow window for reform.

"We understand that we do have some flaws, but [I would like to] remind them that we are still in a stage of reform and development," he said.

"Thank God the CPP is still strong, to keep this country at [the stage] where everyone can enjoy work and enjoy seeing human rights and development."

The new Freedom House report echoes an earlier press freedom report from the organisation, which ranked Cambodia 132nd among 195 countries surveyed.

In its 2008 Corruption Perceptions Index, global corruption monitor Transparency International listed Cambodia as the 166th most-corrupt country out of 180 nations surveyed.

Most Mexicans in U.S. Stay Put Despite Recession

By Tara Bahrampour
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Despite the recession, the flow of Mexican immigrants out of the United States and back into Mexico has stayed level, according to a report released Wednesday by the Pew Hispanic Center.

The report, which used surveys of families in Mexico, Census data and U.S. Border Patrol data, also found a continued decrease in immigration from Mexico since 2006.

Last year, 433,000 people returned to Mexico, compared with 479,000 two years earlier. The number of people coming in decreased more sharply, with 636,000 people arriving last year compared with nearly 1.03 million two years earlier.

"People are essentially staying put at both ends," said Michael Fix, senior vice president of the Migration Policy Institute, after reading the report. "They're basically riding out the storm."

The findings answer questions that have been raised recently about whether immigrants are leaving the United States because of diminished economic prospects, said Jeff Passel, a senior demographer at Pew.

"It's not surprising, and it fits in well with what we've seen in previous economic downturns," he said, adding that even in a good economy, many Mexican immigrants go back and forth across the border.

About 8 in 10 recent immigrants from Mexico are undocumented, so it is impossible to track arrivals and departures precisely. The report said that although the Mexican-born population in the United States, the country's largest immigrant group, grew in the earlier part of the decade, it has stayed steady in recent years at more than 11 million.

Although the report did not analyze causes for the trend, Passel said reasons could include the faltering Mexican economy; tales of drug violence there putting off returnees; and indications that tougher enforcement by U.S. border patrol agents is keeping people in the United States.

"The monetary cost of getting into the United States, and the danger, have increased," he said, noting that those factors might keep people from crossing the border in both directions. "People who have already spent the money and taken the risk . . . might try to stay here and ride it out rather than spend the money to go back to Mexico and try again at a later date."

Although the numbers still show "a lot of dynamic migration" between the two countries, that may change if the recession continues, said Audrey Singer, a demographer at the Brookings Institution. "If we experience more job loss, we'll see fewer people coming," she said.

Although the report focused only on Mexicans, an October Pew report showed the number of illegal immigrants from other Latin American countries in the United States has also decreased.

Minority Turnout Was Critical to Obama's Election, Data Show

By CONOR DOUGHERTY

Census Bureau data released Monday show the extent to which strong minority-voter turnout in the 2008 election helped President Barack Obama win over swing states and make inroads into Republican strongholds.

About five million more people voted for president in November than four years earlier, with minorities accounting for almost the entire increase. About two million more black and Hispanic voters and 600,000 additional Asians went to the polls.

While the figures reflect a long-term demographic shift, they also attest to the success of the Democrats' extensive campaign to register their supporters and get them to the polls. Overall, the 64% turnout was unchanged from four years earlier.

The data also show an increase in turnout by young voters. Those between 18 and 24 had a 49% turnout rate, up from 47% in 2004 -- the only age group to see a statistically significant jump at the polls.

Strong minority support helped Mr. Obama's campaign win swing states such as Ohio and pick off Republican redoubts including Virginia, Nevada and Indiana, according to an analysis of poll and Census data by William H. Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution who blended the Census data on voter turnout with poll data from Voter News Service.

The data are the latest to highlight the demographic conundrum facing the Republican Party, which in 2008 lost several red states to Mr. Obama largely because it couldn't compete among minority voters. This demographic challenge isn't going away, as non-Hispanic whites are expected to account for less than 50% of the U.S. population by 2042.

To be sure, Mr. Obama's victory also relied on white voters: In 19 states including California, New York and Massachusetts, a majority of white voters cast ballots for Mr. Obama.

"Democrats are getting the growing parts of the population: Young people, minorities and states people are moving to," Mr. Frey said.

Mr. Frey cautioned that while the long-term demographic changes favor any candidate that can best harness minority voters, Mr. Obama's success in 2008 doesn't mean an easy road to victory awaits him in 2012. Whites accounted for 76% of voters in 2008, down three percentage points from 2004 but still a substantial majority. His rival, Sen. John McCain, won white voters by 12 percentage points, versus the 17 percentage-point margin enjoyed by George W. Bush in 2004. A Republican candidate who could capture a larger share of whites could neutralize the minority edge that went to Mr. Obama.

"President Obama can continue that momentum only if he continues to hold onto minorities and also hold Republicans at bay among white voters," Mr. Frey said.

Mr. Frey found minority voters made the difference in several key states: North Carolina, Florida, Virginia, Nevada, Ohio, Indiana, Maryland and New Jersey. Mr. Obama's ability to win over minorities there overcame white voters who favored John McCain.

Write to Conor Dougherty at conor.dougherty@wsj.com

Revolutionary Guards Crush Dissent and Widen Control in Iran

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN

CAIRO — As Iran’s political elite and clerical establishment splinter over the election crisis, the nation’s most powerful economic, social and political institution — the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps — has emerged as a driving force behind efforts to crush a still-defiant opposition movement.

From its origin 30 years ago as an ideologically driven militia force serving Islamic revolutionary leaders, the corps has grown to assume an increasingly assertive role in virtually every aspect of Iranian society.

And its aggressive drive to silence dissenting views has led many political analysts to describe the events surrounding the June 12 presidential election as a military coup.

“It is not a theocracy anymore,” said Rasool Nafisi, an expert in Iranian affairs and a co-author of an exhaustive study of the corps for the RAND Corporation. “It is a regular military security government with a facade of a Shiite clerical system.”

The corps has become a vast military-based conglomerate, with control of Iran’s missile batteries, oversight of its nuclear program and a multibillion-dollar business empire reaching into nearly every sector of the economy. It runs laser eye-surgery clinics, manufactures cars, builds roads and bridges, develops gas and oil fields and controls black-market smuggling, experts say.

Its fortune and its sense of entitlement have reportedly grown under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Since 2005, when he took office, companies affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards have been awarded more than 750 government contracts in construction and oil and gas projects, Iranian press reports document. And all of its finances stay off the budget, free from any state oversight or need to provide an accounting to Parliament.

The corps’s alumni hold dozens of seats in Parliament and top government posts. Mr. Ahmadinejad is a former member, as are the speaker of Parliament, Ali Larijani, and the mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf. And the influence of the Revolutionary Guards reaches deep into the education system, where it indoctrinates students in loyalty to the state, and into the state-controlled media, where it guides television and radio programming.

“They are the proponents of an authoritarian modernization, convinced that the clergy should continue supplying the legitimation for the regime as a sort of military chaplains, but definitely not run the show,” said a political scientist who worked in Iran for years, but asked not to be identified to avoid antagonizing the authorities.

They are so influential partly because they present a public front of unity in a state where power has always been fractured. By contrast, clerics have many different agendas and factions. Nonetheless, there are glimmers of fractures under the corps’s opaque and disciplined surface.

Political analysts said that behind the scenes there were internal disagreements about the handling of the election and the demonstrations against disputed results that gave a second term to Mr. Ahmadinejad.

“I have received reports, at least part of the top commanders in the Revolutionary Guards are not happy with what is going on,” said Muhammad Sahimi, a professor at the University of Southern California, who says he has a network of contacts around the country. “There are even reports of some who have protested.”

Even a former commander in the corps, Mohsen Rezai, who served for 16 years, decided to challenge the status quo by running for president this year, and he openly complained of the government’s failure to investigate accusations of vote-rigging.

One political analyst said that many of the rank and file were known to have voted for Mohammad Khatami, an outspoken reformer, when he was first elected president in 1997.

The corps is not large. It has as many as 130,000 members and runs five armed branches that are independent from the much bigger national military. It commands its own ground force, navy, air force and intelligence service. The United Nations Security Council has linked its officials to Iran’s nuclear program. The West suspects Iran of trying to build nuclear weapons, an allegation the government denies.

The corps’s two best-known subsidiaries are the secretive Quds Force, which has carried out operations in other countries, including the training and arming of the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon; and the Basij militia. The Basiji, who experts say were incorporated under the corps’s leadership only two years ago, now include millions of volunteer vigilantes used to crack down on election protests and dissidents.

Members of the Revolutionary Guards and their families receive privileged status at every level, which benefits them in university admissions and in the distribution of subsidized commodities, experts said.

Mr. Nafisi, the RAND report co-author, said a former commander in the corps estimated that all the corps and Basiji members, together with their families, added up to a potential voting bloc of millions of people. “This new machinery of election was quite important in bringing Ahmadinejad forward,” Mr. Nafisi said.

Within this bloc is a core of military elites who have displaced — and at times clashed with — the clerical revolutionaries who worked beside Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in founding the Islamic republic. They are the second generation of revolutionaries, ideologically united and contemptuous of first-generation clerics like former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, and of reformers and those eager to engage with the West. The corps has even trained its own clerics.

In an essay describing the rise of the Revolutionary Guards phenomenon, Professor Sahimi drew a portrait of the new elite: leaders in their mid-50s who as young men joined the corps and fought two wars: one against Iraq in the 1980s and another to force out the Mujahedeen Khalq, which the United States considers a terrorist organization and which is now based in Iraq.

The corps then split into two groups. One believed that Iran needed a chance to develop politically and socially; the other, which emerged the victor, was intent on maintaining strict control. Mr. Nafisi said Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was close to that second group.

“He went to the war front several times, more than any other commander,” Mr. Nafisi said. “He made personal contact with many commanders, got to know them and earned their loyalty. Now all the people in charge were basically assigned to him at the time of war.”

Today, the corps has expanded its role and reach. Its financial interests have, for example, been linked directly to the government’s foreign policy. Iran may well have remained silent on the attacks on Uighur Muslims in China this month in part because Beijing is one of the main trading partners with the corps.

Shortly after the Iran-Iraq war, Mr. Rafsanjani, then the president, encouraged the corps to use its engineers to bolster its own budget and to help rebuild the country. Since then, a Revolutionary Guards company, Khatam al-Anbia, has become one of Iran’s largest contractors in industrial and development projects, according to the RAND report. Its contracts with the government, including projects like the construction of a Tehran subway line, hydroelectric dams, ports and railway systems, are carried out by the company’s subsidiaries or are parceled out to private companies.

What is less quantifiable is the corps’s black-market smuggling activity, which has helped feed the nation’s appetite for products banned by sanctions, while also enriching the corps. The Rand report quoted one member of Iran’s Parliament who estimated that the Revolutionary Guards might do as much as $12 billion in black-market business annually.

In his will, Ayatollah Khomeini asked that the military stay out of politics, and senior Revolutionary Guards officials have been careful to defend themselves against accusations of political meddling after the June 12 election. But Gen. Yadollah Javani, director of the corps’s political arm, warned the public that there was no room for dissent.

“Today, no one is impartial,” he said, according to the official news agency IRNA. “There are two currents: those who defend and support the revolution and the establishment, and those who are trying to topple it.”

Nazila Fathi contributed reporting from Toronto, and Neil MacFarquhar from the United Nations.