SHARES blog
3 April 2014
The exchange of information between Dutch intelligence services and the United States National Security Agency (NSA) is no longer taking place entirely outside the public eye. After a graph published in German news magazine Der Spiegel in August 2013 initially seemed to suggest that the NSA had intercepted 1.8 million records of metadata from Dutch phone calls in the period of December 2012 to January 2013, it became clear this February that Dutch intelligence services had gathered these records themselves, and had subsequently shared them with the NSA. This information consisted of metadata records gathered in the context of anti-terrorism and military operations abroad.
A substantial share of Dutch intelligence efforts is directed towards Somalia, and millions of Somali phone calls have been intercepted from both the Dutch town of Burum and Dutch navy ship HMS Rotterdam. The Netherlands has been collecting this information in order to support the Dutch contribution to the navy missions combating piracy in the Gulf of Aden. The (meta)data is shared with the NSA (who do not have access to Somali telephone traffic) and in return the US has provided the Netherlands with technical support needed to intercept local telephone traffic from the HMS Rotterdam.[1] (more…)
15 March 2014
This is our News Items Overview of 16 February 2014-15 March 2014, a summary of recent news relating to shared responsibility. (more…)
19 February 2014
© Sochi 2014 Olympic Logo
The 2014 Winter Olympics are in full swing. The games, which take place in the Black Sea coastal city of Sochi, should have been a prestige project of huge importance for Russia’s image at home and abroad. Instead, they are turning out to become the most criticized games ever. The controversies surrounding the Sochi games are many: flagrant discrimination against the gay community, forced evictions of homeowners to make way for Olympic venues and infrastructure, environmental destruction of the surrounding land and, of course, the staggering costs of the whole enterprise, totaling an estimated 50 billion dollars. An issue that has received far less media attention is the abuse of migrant workers on whose backs the Olympic sites are built. (more…)
17 February 2014
This is our News Items Overview of 16 January 2014-15 February 2014, a summary of recent news relating to shared responsibility. (more…)
23 January 2014
Lion status in West African protected areas within lion range.
© P. Henschel, L. Coad, C. Burton, B. Chataigner, A. Dunn et al. (see footnote).
A recently published study showed that the lion in West Africa is now critically endangered and faces extinction. From one angle, this would be just one of the large (though unknown) number of species that has previously faced extinction or has even become extinct. But the risk of extinction of some species give more reason for pause than others. Surely the lion – a cultural icon for cultures across the world since time immemorial – deserves a moment of reflection.
The cited study describes how the lion was once the most successful large carnivore. Its range extended from South Africa, across Eurasia, and into the southern United States. Today, the lion’s range is restricted to Africa, with a population of the Asiatic sub-species in India. Lions in Africa have lost 75 percent of their range in the last 100 years. (more…)
