NYMHM: Iran's bicycle crimes, lupus/petroleum link, newspapers sell the farm

Wed May 23 13:42:45 PDT 2007

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 NEWS YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED * May 23, 2007 * Vol. 6, No. 21

 Important but overlooked news from around the world.
 NYMHM is a free service of Newsdesk.org.

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QUOTED: 

   "The dish's installer is very nice and gives a 40 percent discount 
   for clients who have to replace a seized dish. My mother says she 
   can't live without satellite television and she is right, our 
   channels are boring and pious."

   -- Mariam, a 30-year-old Iranian clerk, on a vigorous but unpopular
   morals crackdown in her country (see "Iran," below). 

CONTENTS:

   *Top Stories* 
     Transplant tourism fuels China's live organ harvest
     Saddam's Kurdish spies in the spotlight
     U.S. Sadr plot led to disaster

   *Iran*
     Vice squad targets women on bicycles

   *Media*
     Newspapers sell the farm, give up the goat

   *Public Health*
     Lupus linked to petroleum exposure 

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TOP STORIES
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 > Transplant Tourism Fuels China's Live Organ Harvest

   Activists say the surge of kidneys and other organs available 
   for transplant in China is no accident: they're being harvested 
   from living Falun Gong members imprisoned by the military, and 
   then sold to desperate Western patients on long waiting lists 
   back home. 

   Now Canadian doctors are calling for a ban on visiting doctors 
   from China until the practice is forsworn, and warn transplant
   tourists that their new lease on life comes at a deadly price. 

 > Saddam's Kurdish Spies in the Spotlight

   Allegations that 300 Kurds from several political parties were 
   double agents for Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist government are 
   shaking up the Kurdish establishment. Two newspapers made the 
   allegations based on documents looted from Hussein's intelligence 
   service; some parties are offering amnesty to the accused, or 
   say that the spying was sanctioned. 

   The Kurdish public is in a less charitable mood, calling for 
   trials for suspected collaborators. An investigating council 
   has been formed, but has no powers of prosecution. 

 > U.S. Sadr Plot Led to Disaster

   Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr turned against the United States once 
   and for all in August 2004, when U.S. forces laid seige to his 
   brother's house after inviting him there to finalize peace talks.

   Iraq's National Security Adviser Dr. Mowaffaq Rubai'e claims he was
   used by the U.S. to lure Sadr to the house; but the cleric escaped,
   scuttling the peace plan, entrenching his anti-Americanism, and 
   emboldening the Mahdi Army, which then took over Baghdad and many 
   Shia cities across Iraq, the Independent reports. 

Sources: 

"China kills to harvest organs: MDs"
National Post (Canada), May 18, 2007
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=20d0fa3c-f0a4-4767-ab09-25456c176c4b

"More alleged Kurdish spies exposed"
Institute for War & Peace Reporting, May 11, 2007
http://www.iwpr.net/?p=icr&s=f&o=335516&apc_state=henh

"Exclusive: Secret U.S. plot to kill Al-Sadr"
Independent (U.K.), May 21, 2007
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2565123.ece

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IRAN
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 > Vice Squad Targets Women on Bicycles

   Thousands of women have been cited and hundreds will stand 
   trial for not complying with the Iranian government's new rules 
   on stricter Islamic dress, listening to Western music and even 
   walking a dog in public, which officials consider impure. 

   The new rules, introduced for "the country's moral health," also 
   include a ban on satellite dishes, co-ed Internet cafes, and any 
   public establishment with darkened windows that prevent ...

   GET THE WHOLE STORY: 

   http://www.newsdesk.org/archives/004282.html

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MEDIA
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 > Newspapers Sell the Farm, Give up the Goat

   Across the country, falling newspaper circulation and the flight
   of ad dollars to the Web have caused publishers to fire employees,
   sell their buildings and outsource their ad and subscription 
   departments to India. 

   The San Jose Mercury News is the latest to do so; it follows other
   newspapers across the country, including the ...

   GET THE WHOLE STORY: 

   http://www.newsdesk.org/archives/004283.html

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PUBLIC HEALTH
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 > Lupus Linked to Petroleum Exposure

   Scientists in Boston and New Mexico have shown that exposure to 
   petroleum is linked to the deadly auto-immune disease lupus, 
   with residents of low-income and minority communities ... 

   GET THE WHOLE STORY:

   http://www.newsdesk.org/archives/004284.html

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Editors: Julia Scott, Josh Wilson
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