Novel coronavirus is an epidemy in a number of countries, most prominently from our point of view including the country closest to us. It has not been declared a pandemic yet as in most countries it has so far been largely contained but people have been looking at growth graphs and many are describing themselves [...]
Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad testified yesterday in his own defence at the New York trial he is facing for busting US sanctions against Iran and for bank fraud. It is rare for a criminal case defendant to testify in their own case and they cannot be forced to do so. However, now that he has [...]
Judge Edwina Grima yesterday denied Alfred and George Degiorgio’s application for bail while they await the conclusion of their ongoing trial proceedings on the charge of murdering Daphne Caruana Galizia. The Degiorgios were arrested along with co-accused Vincent Muscat early in December 2017, around 6 weeks after the assassination of the journalist on 16 October [...]
The following was sent to this website by Mark Gauci, chief executive of the Occupational Health and Safety Authority. He was reacting to an earlier post published this morning about a petition calling for the OHSA's worked to be checked in view of deadly accidents on building sites. I refer to your post ‘Italian entrepreneur [...]
New York’s Columbia University has included the case brought in Malta against Minister Owen Bonnici for the removal of flowers and candles and protest messages and banners from the Great Siege Memorial in front of the court building in its database of human rights courts decisions that “expand free expression”. This is the second case [...]
Malta-based entrepreneur Daniele Baraggioli, originally from Italy, has launched a change.org petition asking for an EU commission to visit Malta and visit excavation and building sites and make recommendations on changes to Maltese laws to protect families living next door to major building sites. The petition was launched in the aftermath of the death of [...]
Continues from yesterday. This part concludes this series by someone known to me. Dom Mintoff stifled and persecuted the private sector with his centralised economy. Inevitably, private businessmen flocked to the Nationalist Party. The latter party was enriched with donations irrespective of whether they were solicited or not. This was in support of the Nationalists’ [...]
The new hospital cleaning contractor Mediclean JV, that has taken over from Servizzi Malta the management of several hundred employees cleaning Malta’s public hospitals, is refusing to authorise vacation leave for its staff unless they find their own replacement while they’re away. In practice this prevents employees, particularly expatriates who form a large portion of [...]
Inner City Press reporter Matthew Russell Lee is covering the Ali Sadr trial in New York. And he wrote this song.
Continues from yesterday's piece filed by someone known to me: Cosa Nostra’s activities include protection racketeering, arbitration of secret contracts between shady entities and the organisation and oversight of illegal agreements and transactions, where all three parties profit, including the mafiosi who claim considerable brokerage or commission fees. Among their other activities are participation in [...]
A study published in specialist academic journal Early Human Development measures the impact on the rate of boys born in a society living in the aftermath of the assassination of journalists. The study, authored by Thomas Calleja, measures changes in the ratio of births between boys and girls after Veronica Guerin was killed in Ireland [...]
If you haven’t watched The Laundromat yet, I highly recommend you do. It’s a film based on the Panama Papers starring Meryl Streep who dedicated her performance to Daphne Caruana Galizia, a journalist ‘killed while collecting Panama Papers information.’ This tribute was made before the arrest of Yorgen Fench whose offshore company 17 Black was [...]
The set is by Robert Agius. Read the report of the event here.
Adds video of statements: https://youtu.be/iv8L6GOElG0 The government put up pictures of exemplary women at the entrance of City Gate, role models each for generations of women who fill finally transform this country into a society where it does not matter if you're a woman or a man. We're a long way away from that [...]
I have not written anything about COVID-19. Dealing with disease is a science and seeking to contain its consequences involves the science of managing prejudice, sometimes mass hysteria. Polemicists are useful for politics or sport or culture. Anything beyond science is a distraction for medicine. So, I will not comment on whether I think the [...]
Sent in by someone known to me: The secret of a great success for what you are at a loss to account is a crime that has never been found and because it was properly executed. – Honoré de Balzac A mafia state has been defined as a state system where the government is tied [...]
Monday 16th March, 2020: 6:30pm 29 months. 126 weeks. The assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia deprived a family of a wife, mother, sister and daughter. It also deprived us of her voice as an independent journalist, crucial to our fragile democracy and our right to know the truth. They tried to silence her to cover [...]
Former Times of Malta journalist Ivan Camilleri filed a judicial protest against his former employer demanding compensation for what he insists is his unlawful dismissal. Ivan Camilleri was dismissed on the same day that the directors of the company that owns the Times newspapers accused him of shoplifting and of tipping Yorgen Fenech off ahead [...]
Proceedings in the US trial against Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad being held in the Southern District of New York building in lower Manhattan have been suspended after presiding judge Alison Nathan was informed that the US Centre for Disease Control (CDC) had contacted one of the prospective jurors in the case about possible contagion of [...]
Two years ago, Tim Sebastian interviewed Chris Fearne who had the unenviable job of defending a government in denial about corruption in its ranks and about its failure to acknowledge its responsibility to ensure its critics were not blown up in car bombs. Much water has passed under the bridge since that interview. Joseph Muscat [...]