news.ft.com By Jonathan Guthrie Published: January 25 2003 4:00 | Last Updated: January 25 2003 4:00

Tens of thousands of fifth-formers across the UK will come to terms this weekend with the miserable realisation that they cannot afford to take a gap year between school and university.

They had dreamt of seeing Uluru on a red, outback dawn. Or inculcating English into poncho-wearing Andean children. Some merely planned to work to finance their higher education.

But proposals to allow universities to charge tuition fees of up to £30,000 to students starting courses from autumn 2006 mean that taking a gap year could prove expensive.

The Department for Education said yesterday that it had no plans to exempt students deferring the start of university from 2005 to 2006 from higher fees.

About 80,000 undergrad-uates from a total of 330,000 accepted annually by British universities take a year out before beginning their studies. The number has grown sharply over the past 5-6 years with the advent of cheap long-haul airfares.

But a slump is expected in 2005-06 if the government does not relent on deferred entrants, as the National Union of Students is calling on it to do. "We are very concerned that numbers will drop, and recognise it is a big problem we will have to face," said Gap Activity Projects, an educational charity which places 2,000 young Britons a year with voluntary programmes in 34 countries.

Charles Clarke, the burly and bearded education minister, never had much chance of becoming a pin-up for teenagers. But he is now even more unpopular with a slew of 15- and 16-year-olds than annoying kid brothers and embarrassing dads.

"My parents have advised me not to take a gap year now," said Natasha McCarthy, sitting with fellow pupils in the wood-panelled entrance hall of King Edward VII High School For Girls in Edgbaston, Birmingham. She had planned to split her gap year between travelling and work experience with an accountancy firm.

Sara Sehdev, another pupil at the academically supercharged school, had received "an amazing offer" to work for a New Zealand TV company. "Now I won't be able to take that up," she said sadly.

But isn't a gap year just a chance to bum around the world with a backpack? Not according to Olivia Toye, another fifth-former: "We've been in an academic cocoon since we were tiny," she said. "This would have been a chance to experience real life before more education."

The group, which includes Natasha, Sara and Olivia, will "miss out on valuable personal development opportunities", said NUS president Mandy Telford, as well as having to find other ways to bolster their CVs.

Students abandoning plans for gap years will meanwhile put added pressure on places in the autumn of 2005. Experts think the number of deferrals will build up again, though to a lower level, in succeeding years.

The upside will be a temporary reduction in college bars, recounting tales of bandits in Brazil, amoebic dysentery in Azerbaijan and the time Ben fell in the sea near Brisbane.

2003-01-25 The Oklahoman

An Israeli diplomat gave a chilling warning for Americans and other potential victims of terrorism during her visit Friday to Oklahoma City.

"We Israelis know that the terrorists consider Israel as the laboratory for terrorism," said Yael Ravia-Zadok, consul general of Israel to the southwest United States. "The methods they use against Israel today will be used against others in different regions of the world tomorrow."

Ravia-Zadok, stationed in Houston for the next three years, was named to her post in August. She oversees U.S.- Israel relations with Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico and Texas.

In an interview with The Oklahoman on her first visit to the state, she said the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks gave people a perspective of life in Israel.

"In Israel, you feel on one hand a wonderful, dynamic society that has wonderful cultural life with movies and theaters and opera and museums," she said. "On the other hand we have to deal with the daily threat of terror."

Before arriving in the United States, Ravia-Zadok spent six years in Israel with her husband and three children. Before that she served as Israel's consul to Brazil and as deputy director of the South American Department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

She said something as simple as sending her children to school is a decision that must be considered on a daily basis.

"We Israelis took the spiritual decision of not surrendering to terror," she said. "We keep our routine, we keep our daily life. We keep sending our children to school and we keep going to sit in restaurants because we won't let the terror dictate our lives.

"The main message that we can deliver or we can share with our American friends is that we can't let the terror win. The world is different, the threats are different, we are dealing with mass- destructive weapons and capabilities that are in the hands of lunatics and tyrants."

"We share with the American nation common values of being in a democracy, believing in freedom, believing in peace," she said. "After Sept. 11, we share with the American nation the struggle against terror."

Ravia-Zadok said she hopes to further improve relations between the two countries during her tenure. Improvements in commerce and scientific exchange are areas she plans to emphasize, she said.

"If we will not stop the terror today, in Israel and that region, we will have to deal with it and we'll see it spreading all over. Those that deny or ignore the need to strangle terrorism today may be sorry tomorrow."

www.amin.org January 25, 2003 Press Release

On the evening of 22 January 2003, Mrs. 'Abla Sa'adat, along with 2 other Palestinian women, Iman Abu Farra and Fatmeh Zayed, held at Beit El military detention center, were issued 4 month administrative detention orders. Addameer's lawyer was able to visit Beit El on Thursday evening, when he was informed of the administrative detention orders for the three women. Mrs. Sa'adat also informed the lawyer that if they were not transferred to adequate detention facilities, they would begin an open-ended hunger strike. There is no information on their current situation as of the time of writing, as visits to detainees are not allowed during Fridays and Saturdays.

Mrs. Sa'adat was detained while traveling to the World Social Forum in Brazil as a delegate representing Addameer on 21 January 2003. She was transferred on the same day in an Israeli military jeep from the Karamah Border Crossing to Jordan at approximately 4 pm. She was held in the jeep until 10 pm, with the military authorities refusing to accept her at Beit El due to a lack of detention facilities for women at the holding center. Mrs. Sa'adat was placed in an isolation cell, with another female detainee, without being questioned or interrogated. Her personal belongings were taken from her, including her mobile phone, address book, airline ticket to Brazil, and her money.

Mrs. Sa'adat is being held in an isolation cell measuring 2m x 2.5 meters, with 1 and a half mattresses. The cell is extremely cold, and the female detainees share a toilet located outside of the cell with male detainees. She was first allowed to use the toilet and leave her cell when her lawyer visited her on Thursday, 2 days after her detention. Mrs. Sa'adat was suffering from diarrhea at the time, causing great discomfort, and also suffers from a slipped disc and low blood pressure.

Two other female administrative detainees, 24-year-old Iman Ibrahim Abdel Qader Abu Farra, from Sourif, Hebron, and 23 year old Fatmeh Ibrahim Mahmoud Zayed, from Yamoun, Jenin, are also being held in Beit El military detention center. They are both fourth year students at the Religious Studies College of Al Quds University, Abu Dis. The two roommates were arrested from their apartment in Im Al Sharayit, a suburb of Ramallah, on 20 January 2003.

Beit El military detention center has no facilities for female detainees, and the conditions of detention of the three women are inhumane. They are allowed to go to the toilet only 3 times a day, are not allowed to walk outside for fresh air, are not allowed a change of clothing and are being held in cold isolation cells. The only fluids allowed are tap water, breakfast and dinner consist of a piece of bread with a small tub of yogurt, and lunch consists of a small plate of rice with beans and a small piece of meat.

Addameer is concerned that the use of administrative detention against female Palestinians will become a new trend in Israel's systematic use of administrative detention as a form of collective punishment. There are currently over 1,200 Palestinians in administrative detention, living in inhumane conditions. Since the beginning of the current Intifada, only 2 other women were placed in administrative detention in 2002. Prior to this, the last female administrative detainee was Itaf Eliyan, who was given 3 months administrative detention in October 1997, and released in January 1998.

Addameer calls on the international community to voice its protest against Israel's use of administrative detention as a form of collective punishment, illegal under international law. Addameer also urges the international community to intervene on behalf of Mrs. 'Abla Sa'adat, calling for a halt to the detention and harassment of Palestinian human rights defenders.

www.sfbayview.com “They can take my taxes, send me to war, but can’t feed me.” - 2Pac by JR   “I couldn’t see myself taking part in nothing where I would help and aid in any way the shooting and killing of these Asiatic dark Black people who haven’t called me nigger, haven’t lynched me, they haven’t deprived me of freedom, justice and equality, they haven’t assassinated my leaders. I couldn’t see myself shooting little Black babies and Black children who don’t even have food to eat.”

• Muhammad Ali against the Vietnam War, 1964

Just as Willie Ratcliff, publisher of the San Francisco Bay View newspaper, stated in his speech Saturday at the historic anti-war rally, the Black community has been engaged in war ever since we left the shores of Africa in chains over four centuries ago. So if the country is going to start a true anti-war movement, then this anti-war movement needs to begin by addressing the war that the Ameriklan government and big business via the police are waging on Black communities right here. Then we can span the world.

The Oakland police who identify themselves as the “Riders” terrorizing, beating, killing and falsely imprisoning Black people in Oakland, that’s war! The SFPD beating up Black teenagers in Hunters Point, fondling the bodies of teenage Black girls and beating a 14-year-old boy into a concussion in front of their parents who were being held at gun point last MLK Day, that’s war! The Swat Team, the SFPD and Sheriff’s Department in riot gear running up in Thurgood Marshall High on Oct. 11, 2002, beating up and arresting 11 Black students and a Black teacher and not being held accountable, that’s war! Capt. Puccinelli from the Bayview police station commanding officers in both of these instances of terrorizing Black people still having a job in the Black community and not being brought up on assault and organized crime charges, that’s war!

The San Francisco Police Department forcibly drugging Askari X, that’s war! The Chicago police murdering unarmed 21-year-old Michael Walker on Oct. 27, 2002, in the Cabrini Green projects, that’s war! Aaron Patterson being tortured and forced to “confess” to a crime that he didn’t commit, then having almost two decades stolen from his life in an Illinois concentration camp, that’s war! The almost decade-long political imprisonment and two assassination attempts in three months on the life of Young Chairman Fred Hampton Jr., that’s war! The assassination attempt by uniformed Chicago police of POCC Defense Minister Akbar in Chicago, that’s war!

Banks operating in Black communities, refusing to loan money to Black businesses, that’s war! Amerikkka trying to overthrow the governments of Haiti, Venezuela, Zimbabwe and Brazil, that’s war! Amerikkka drilling for oil in Alaskan national parks and offshore, polluting land, air and water for wildlife and future generations, that’s war!

Gov. Gray Davis of California cutting over $2 billion from education and increasing prison funding, that’s war! The nation’s prison system refusing to grant medical treatment to Black Panther prisoners like Seth Hayes because of their righteous political beliefs, that’s war! The United States holding over a million Black people in prison, that’s war! The Ameriklan government violating our human rights, that’s war!

I just had to state that because at Saturday’s rally, many of the speakers were trying to mimic speeches by Dr. King like “I Have a Dream” or some speech at the anti-Vietnam War rallies in the ‘60s, using a lot of colorful rhetoric instead of making real connections as to what our real problem is; the arrogant attitude, policies and decision-making of the United Snakes government from an international all the way down to a local level.

People say it was the biggest protest in the history of San Francisco. The crowd was enormous, estimated to be about 350,000 people rallying in the streets against the Bush regime’s threats against Iraq. People were everywhere.

For most of the people at the rally, it was a day for them to feel like they were adding their voice to the opposition. But the real test comes when the question is asked, what are they ready to do - besides attending a rally to stop the direction in which George Hitler Bush is taking the world.

One organized response planned for the day that the U.S. initiates war on Iraq is a nationwide boycott and strike. So remember, when it starts to go down, don’t buy anything or go to work or to school. That’s how we can screw up the economy and take the profit out of big businesses that think war is profitable. We should also start looking into alternatives like solar energy, and using our car less, so we don’t have to buy stolen oil from the Bush regime.

Some of the better speakers that I heard from the stage Saturday were Miguel Molina from La Onda, a radio show on KPFA, Tony Gonzalez from the International Indian Treaty Council, and Hatem Bazian, a Palestinian activist. Unfortunately, although I heard one rapper, there wasn’t a single speaker who represented the voice of Black youth in the Bay Area, which is a bad start for the anti-war movement in relation to the young Black community and the war that we’re engaged in from hood to hood, nationwide.

Simultaneous anti-war marches were organized in D.C. and 30 other countries throughout the world, including South Africa, Japan, Germany, France, Russia and Egypt, which resulted in millions on the same day worldwide speaking out against Amerikkka’s global oppression. I just hope everybody takes this anti-war attitude back home and speaks out against the way African and other oppressed people are being treated worldwide, from Hunters Point and Port-au-Prince to Soweto, Harare and Cairo, because not enough is being said or done to offer solidarity to our people who are fighting for self-determination on European/European-minded occupied land worldwide.

In gauging the results of Saturday’s rally, as Malcolm used to say, “Only time will tell” if the sleeping oppressed have been awakened into action.

Email JR at fire@sfbayview.com.

business.iafrica.com Posted Tue, 21 Jan 2003

Tokyo and Osaka remain the world's most expensive cities, while political turmoil and weaker currencies have put Zimbabwe's capital Harare and South American cities in the cheapest list, a new report has found.

London has dropped a couple of notches from a year ago to seventh place, although it remains the most expensive city in the European Union, with Oslo jumping to third costliest overall, overtaking Hong Kong which fell to fourth, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) said in the report received in Singapore.

New York, the most expensive city in North America, fell to 11th place overall from 10th place last year.

"All euro-zone cities have become comparatively more expensive over the past year as the currency has strengthened — and as prices were hiked during the changeover to euro notes and coins," it said.

On the other end of the spectrum, cities located in countries mired in political and economic turmoil saw their cost of living indices plunge.

Harare, the co-host of the upcoming Cricket World Cup, is now the cheapest city in the world, ranking 134th this year after falling 63 notches from its year 2002 ranking of 71st, EIU said.

Buenos Aires in Argentina fell 109 places to number 130 in the rankings following the collapse of its currency.

"Other South American cities such as Caracas in Venezuela and Montevideo in Uruguay are also big fallers," it said.

Caracas, crippled by a general strike aimed at toppling President Hugo Chavez, dropped 53 notches to rank 109th. Montevideo plunged 75 places to rank 121st.

New York and Chicago, in 11th and 13th places overall, are the most expensive North American cities, while Atlanta is the cheapest among the American cities covered by the poll.

Tokyo, Osaka, Hong Kong and Singapore remained the cosliest cities in Asia. Seoul rose to 13th overall worldwide from being number 21 due to a strengthening of its currency.

In Asia, Indian cities offer the best bargains with New Delhi and Bombay the cheapest.

"Australian cities all rose in the rankings, due to relatively high inflation and a strengthening Australian dollar. Sydney is the most expensive and Adelaide the cheapest," the statement said.

New Zealand cities have also become costlier, EIU said.

Libreville in Gabon is the most expensive city in Africa, followed by Abidjan in the Ivory Coast.

Tel Aviv is the most expensive in the Middle East "although a weakening shekel (currency) saw it become relatively cheaper in 2002."

Tehran is the cheapest city in the Middle East and the second cheapest in the world.

AFP