For two months now we've been waiting for the Independent to investigate accusations made against one of its most lauded writers: Johann Hari . Hari was accused of lifting quotes from various sources, including other people's interviews, books and so on. He was also accused of maliciously altering the Wikipedia entries of other...
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On Saturday September 3, the English Defence League (EDL) had planned to hold a march to Tower Hamlets in London. Tower Hamlets was chosen because it is strongly Muslim. I've been to a number of protests over the past 12 months, including the large gathering the EDL staged in Luton in February, and...
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I went out to Camden to meet a friend last night. Here are a few things that happened in the five hours I was out: A distressed-looking woman came up to me in the street and said, "Help me! Please! My fella has just beaten me up and I don't know what to...
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By now, most of us are familiar with the case of 20-year-old Malaysian student Asyraf Haziq, whose mugging in East London went viral on YouTube. Here it is, in case you missed it: News reports have all said something alone the lines of: The student was held up at knifepoint and punched. Several...
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Nothing less than what he deserved, especially as The Met has threatened to prosecute anyone seen to be using social media to fuel the riots. From the Indy : Following his recent tweets and statements on the London riots, The Independent will no longer be taking blogs from Jody McIntyre.
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Following on from yesterday's post , it appears that nothing is going to stop Jody Mcintyre latching onto the London riots and proclaiming them as part of his revolution. It's getting beyond a joke now. Mcintyre needs a serious dose of reality.
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It's difficult to draw any solid conclusions from what went on in Tottenham last night, but one thing I've noticed is how quick some on the Left have been to pounce on the unrest and manipulate the facts to further their own agendas. Here's what we can say for sure: "Suspected gangster" Mark...
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Today was Burmese Martyrs' Day and about 200 people gathered at the Burmese embassy in London to call for democracy and the release of political prisoners.
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It's been a rough couple of weeks for Johann Hari, an award-winning British journo and writer who contributes to the Independent and the Huff Post. Hari has been accused of plagiarism for taking other people's quotes or quotes from books and integrating them into his own interviews. There have been numerous stories and...
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Little video I made with footage I shot from London Pride 2011 yesterday.
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We've all been very quick to praise social media and its wondrous benefits, but it has become abundantly clear now that if you say the wrong thing at the wrong time you will be lynched. Sometimes it pays to keep your mouth shut, as author and occasional Guardian commenter Kia Abdullah found out to her...
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If you're planning to study at SOAS , or even just thinking about it, you will no doubt be wondering where you are going to live. The option that most people take is living in SOAS halls of residence provided by Sanctuary Management Services , Dinwiddy House for the undergrads and Paul Robeson...
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Coming back to the UK after living in Asia for a while has given me a chance to reflect on how the West views the East, and I have to say, I think there are times when Western critiques of Southeast Asian countries, Thailand in particular, border on the hypocritical. There was such...
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When I returned to the UK after five-odd years in exile, people kept asking me how I was coping. You must be going through a bit of a culture shock, they asserted. People said this so often that I managed to convince myself that I was in fact going through reverse culture shock....
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It's the final week of semester here and we're approaching a crucial time in terms of final essays and exam revision. It is therefore unacceptable that we at SOAS lose two days of lectures this week. The Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) have held a national strike ballot on proposed changes to the...
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Pattaya, 10th March 2011 : On Thursday afternoon (17th March 2011), Pattaya will be celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, along with other cities in the world such as Dublin, New York, Belfast, London and Sydney.
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There's something peculiar going on in Great Britain. Misinformation and ignorance are eating up the airwaves like never before. Propaganda, half-truths and blatant lies muddy the waters to the point where you can no longer see the fish from the rocks. Nowhere is this state of confusion more visible than in the public...
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Today was dayx5, the latest in a series of student protests against education cuts in the UK. Students took to the streets of London and Manchester to voice their displeasure at the Con-Dem coalition's plans. I have quite a lot to say about the protests, but before I get to that, here's a...
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Student activist and Uni of London President Clare Solomon this week survived a vote of no-confidence at SOAS, where the 37-year-old is enrolled as a student. Solomon, who supports militancy in the campaign for free education, was called out for being a "a prominent member of the radical, militant, far left organisation Counterfire"....
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A rather modest email went out today, presumably from one of the leaders of the mighty SOAS occupation. After nearly three weeks in the Brunei Suite, we have decided that the SOAS occupation has almost reached the end of its current stage. During our time in occupation, the political landscape in Britain has...
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We already know Clare Solomon wants students to rise up and take what's apparently rightfully theirs, ie free education on a plate. Now the occupations and the silliness begin. Solomon as president of the Uni of London Union is tomorrow holding a workshop on occupations, walk-outs, and road blockages. The aim of these...
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Clare Solomon is the University of London Union president. She says education should be free for all and that if it's not, she fully supports a campaign of "occupation", as she put it, coming off the back of the Millbank incident last week. Here she was on Newsnight last week looking a bit...
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A Cambridge student, who apparently stands behind his (or her) values so much that he won't put his name behind his words , justified yesterday's Millbank madness by saying it created "job stimulus". he broken windows mean someone will get paid for repairing them. Is that student wit?
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Yesterday's student protest in London may well prove to be the downfall of NUS president Aaron Porter. There have been calls for his resignation after a breakaway group of students/anarchists unleashed their fury on Millbank Tower and 30 Millbank. As someone who has been through the British education system, at school in Bath,...
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Today 50,000 students from around the UK took to the streets of London to protest against our government's plans to raise university tuition fees to astronomical heights. The students, myself included, marched through London, waving placards and chanting a variety of anti-government slogans. The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day....
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There was a peculiar story in The Guardian today about two students, one from SOAS, being thrown off a plane to Nairobi after complaining about about how a deportee was being treated. "He was handcuffed, clearly in pain and being violently restrained," said Matt Taylor, 29, an undergraduate at the School of Oriental...
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I went to Sainsbury's to do some shopping yesterday. I get quite into my shopping because for the first time in a long time, I cannot rely on street food and restaurants for my daily meals, or anything else for that matter. So shopping has become something of a mini-adventure.
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During induction week here at my illustrious university of choice in London, it was hammered home that SOAS isn't special — it's unique. I think they tell that to every new student, every year. I have no idea if SOAS really is unique.
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Members of the Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSC) and Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods (JBIG) came out for a protest in Covent Garden on Saturday against Ahava, an Israeli company with a factory in Mitzpe, an Israeli settlement in the occupied Palestinian West Bank. Ahava is a chain of stores offering cosmetics based on...
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I was in Timor-Leste for two years, Thailand for more than four years, and other places like Bangladesh for short stints here and there. But after meeting a bunch of people here at SOAS , I feel like I may as well have been at a bake sale for the past few years....
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