Nexus - 0503 - New Times Magazine-pages

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... GLOBAL NEWS ... NEWS Thailand and the Philippines move to can- cel or suspend significant arms purchases. An example is Thailand's request to rene- gotiate the US$390 million contract for eight F-18A jet fighters. A special assistant from the US Treasury accompanied Cohen to advise Asian gov- ernment leaders on how their arms repay- ments could be extended, rolled over or paid off in some other way. (Source: Green Left Weekly, 18 Feb 1998) their research and chronology. At that point, strange things started to happen: Fullagar's application to the Australian Research Council for funding to continue the research was unsuccessful; and an article about the Jinmium contro- versy appeared in an obscure publication, the National Pictographic Society News Letter. The article was published under Dr Paul Tacon's name and contained many factual errors and unattributed quotations. Tacon, though, has never heard of the soci- ety, nor did he have anything to do with the piece. He is now considering legal action. In December 1997 the Sydney Morning Herald made another splash on the subject by announcing that "new dating tech- niques" had revised this figure from the 176,000 maximum to 40,000 years and possibly only 10,000 or 5,000 years. It seems that a new team of 'experts' has found reason to reinterpret Fullagar's team's findings. However, team member David Price, a geochronologist at the University of Wollongong, stands by his dating. He strongly disagrees with the contention that he fell into a "methodological misconcep- tion" on a technical matter. (Source: SMH, 23 December 1997) is safer than alcohol or tobacco. According to the report which was leaked to New Scientist magazine, the analysis concludes not only that the amount of cannabis smoked worldwide does less harm to public health than alco- hol and cigarettes, but that the same is likely to hold true even if people con- sumed it on the same scale as these legal substances. The report was to be the WHO's first report on cannabis for 15 years and was being eagerly awaited by doctors and spe- cialists in drug abuse. However, it was ditched at the last minute following a long, intense dispute between WHO officials, the cannabis experts who drafted the report, and a group of external advisers believed to be from the US National Institute on Drug Abuse and the UN International Drug Control Program. According to one member of the expert panel who drafted the report, it was feared by the advisers that the report would be used by groups campaigning to legalise marijuana. (Source: New Scientist, 27 February 1998) ARCHAEOLOGICAL TURMOIL OVER ANCIENT SITE IN CHILE he discovery of a site some 12,500 years old in Monte Verde, Chile, has thrown the archaeological world into uproar. The site is 1,300 years older than the previously oldest known site, and it is about 16,000 km away from the Asian- Alaskan land-bridge over which the first Americans are thought to have migrated. Given that massive glaciers covered much of the continent at that time, the first settlers could have migrated between 14,500 and 40,000 years ago. (Source: Reuters; Sydney Morning Herald, 18 February 1998) LUDICROUS ITEMS EMBARGOED IN IRAQ SANCTIONS hese are just a few of the items that have been, and still are, under embargo to Iraq since the Gulf War: aluminium foil, ambulances, ashtrays, axes, balls, bas- kets, bed lamps, belts, bicycles, books (all categories), candles, candlesticks, carpets, cars, chairs, coats, combs, computers, desks, detergents, dishes, dolls, doorknobs, doormats, envelopes, electric cords, eye- STORM OVER AGE OF AUSTRALIAN ROCK CUPULES I mainstream science rejecting contro- versial research data because it does not conform with accepted parameters? In September 1996, the Sydney Morning Herald announced to the world that a team of scientists had found Aboriginal rock art and stone tools at Jinmium in the remote Northern Territory, which implied that the first people arrived in Australia between 116,000 and up to 176,000 years ago—more than 100,000 years earlier than scientists had believed. Naturally, if this were shown to be true, the entire global history of man would have to be rewritten. It would have been obvious to the team of four scientists—David Price, Paul Tacon, Lesley Head and Richard = Fullagar (the team leader)—that this was no small announcement, and no doubt they checked and rechecked their findings very carefully before making the announcement that would either make them or break them. Predictably, the interest was imme- diate and intense, resulting in a very hectic year for all four scientists. Despite the pressure, they stuck to FAVOURABLE CANNABIS REPORT COVERED UP fficials at the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva have suppressed the publication of a politically sensitive report that confirms what ageing hippies have known for decades: cannabis APRIL - MAY 1998 NEXUS -7