L'Américain David Headley a plaidé coupable de terrorisme, jeudi 18 mars, devant un tribunal de Chicago, pour son rôle dans la préparation des attentats de Bombay en 2008 et d'un projet d'attentat au Danemark dans l'affaire des caricatures de Mahomet.

Former senior tax manager says tax-avoidance schemes amounted to false accounting

A former employee of Lloyds Banking Group has accused the bank of artificially inflating its profits by almost £1bn through the use of aggressive tax-avoidance schemes and exotic "Lehman- style" offshore deals which he said amounted to false accounting.

The former senior tax manager at the bank told an employment tribunal Lloyds was involved in running battles with Revenue & Customs after it embarked on a hostile relationship with the tax authority over multimillion-pound corporation tax bills while involved in extensive manipulation of the way it accounted for unpaid taxes.

Between 2005 and 2007, he said, the bank insisted that finance staff devise ever more elaborate ways to depress a growing tax bill, many of them involving the now collapsed Lehman Brothers and the discredited financial products division of AIG, the American insurer that cost the US government $80bn to rescue. By 2007, the bank was excluding more than £900m of potential tax in its accounts, allowing it to inflate profits by the same amount.

Lloyds, which is now 41% owned by the taxpayer following its government-backed takeover of HBOS two years ago, denied the charges, which it said were investigated and found to be "without merit". The bank said: "Lloyds Banking Group strongly believes it complies with all of its obligations under tax law, both in the UK and overseas. We will vigorously defend any claims that suggest otherwise."

But the bank's former head of tax compliance, Andrew Constantine, told the employment tribunal that Lloyds refused to listen to staff who voiced concerns about the tactics adopted by the finance department, or institute reforms that would put its finances on a legal footing.

For three years he made representations to board members that the tax planning adopted by the bank was unethical and amounted to false accounting. He also warned that a breakdown in the relationship with HMRC would damage the bank and lead to even higher tax bills.

His testimony echoes claims by Paul Moore, the former head of group regulatory risk at HBOS, who alleged he had repeatedly been threatened after claiming internally that the bank's lending policies posed "a serious risk to financial stability and consumer protection".

Constantine, 54, was made redundant last September in a move he said was driven by the desire to silence a whistleblower. He said his early retirement also contravened laws on age discrimination.

Last year, following a long-running investigation, HMRC accused Lloyds at a tax tribunal of disguising loans to American banks as investments in order to avoid potentially large tax payments. Lawyers for HMRC said Lloyds and other UK banks were involved in moving funds worth hundreds of millions of pounds from one jurisdiction to another to avoid tax.

Lloyds was accused by MPs on the Treasury select committee of bending the rules to maximise profits, which also resulted in large bonuses for executive directors.

Lloyds Banking Group's chief executive, Eric Daniels, who is the only surviving chief executive of a taxpayer-owned bank, told the committee: "I would tell you that we do not do anything other than adhere to the spirit and letter of the law."

Constantine, who has since become head of tax at the FTSE 100 insurance group Aviva, said it was a longstanding aim of the Lloyds board to limit its tax charge, but it was only in 2006 that the use of artificial vehicles to hide potential liabilities began to make a significant impact.

"If the finance director wanted a new tax figure their staff worked to that figure and they delivered it too," he said. "The tail was wagging the dog in that the need to hit the bank's effective tax rate forecasts was driving the business."

Lloyds said it did not dispute that Constantine told senior executives of his deep misgivings. It said: "Mr Constantine's allegations about the Group's tax planning were fully investigated and found to be without merit. The Group maintains an open and transparent dialogue with HM Revenue & Customs. We have made adequate provisions for all our tax liabilities.

"Like any organisation, we will seek to reduce tax impact where it is practical and appropriate but we always comply with all aspects of tax regulations in all the jurisdictions within which we operate."

• Lloyds Banking Group
• Tax avoidance

Phillip Inmanguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

BRUXELLES Le tribunal antidopage flamand (VDT) a suspendu pour trois mois ferme le joueur belgo-brésilien de Tubize (D2), contrôlé positif au cannabis après un match au Lierse en novembre dernier.Sa saison est terminée. Il est encore sous contrat à Tubize ...

O2 says better approach would be for copyright holders to devise a new business model where customers get what they want, when and where they want it, for a “fair price.”

UK ISP O2, the “leading provider of mobile phones and broadband” in that country, has condemned the approach to illegal P2P taken by law firm ACS:Law in which it’s been ending thousands of “settlement letters” to suspected file-sharers.

It prefers a “win-win” approach to the problem that involves “encouraging the development of new business models that offer customers the content they want, how they want it, for a fair price.”

Even the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), hardly an advocate of developing new business models to combat illegal file-sharing, has criticized ACS:Law, though it prefers a “three-strikes” graduated response system instead.

ACS:Law announced an initial plan to target some 15,000 alleged illegal file-sharers across the UK last December as part of a “revolutionary business model that “generates revenue for rights holders and effectively decreases copyright infringement in a measurable and sustainable way” unlike what it says are “costly and ineffective” anti-piracy measures used by other companies.

After careful review it later decided to drop a number of those cases, limiting their lawsuits only to those it deemed “viable” or “beneficial to its clients.”

Soon thereafter Which?, the largest consumer body in the UK with over 650,000 members, reported it had received letters from more than 150 people claiming to have been wrongly accused, with even more now choosing to come forward after hearing they’re not alone.

Some of the P2P lawsuits were handed over by Davenport Lyons, the law firm which in many ways pioneered the controversial strategy. It’s worth noting that two of the law firm’s partners at the time, David Gore and Brian Miller, will soon face the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal over complaints they engaged in “bullying” and “excessive” conduct while acting on behalf of client copyright holders.

However, ACS:Law seems immune to any criticisms.

“Neither we nor our clients threaten or bully anyone,” said Andrew Crossley of ACS: Law. “We send out letters of claim to account holders of internet connections where those internet connections have been identified as being utilized for illegal file-sharing of our clients’ copyrighted works.”

Crossley emphasized that the real crime is not overzealous lawyers, but rather the fact that his clients are losing money to illegal P2P.

“My clients are losing money because of copyright infringement and they are equally upset that their copyright is being stolen,” he said. .

That may be so, but suing people en masse will never solve the problem. Crossley, apparently unaware of the failed history of the RIAA pursuing a similar approach for almost a decade, even chastises the BPI for not doing the same.

“I think the BPI is letting its members down. I think they are scared of alienating their customers,” he said. “My clients don’t have the same fear. They take the view that the people they target aren’t their customers because they are stealing from them.”

If that’s what his clients truly believe then their sadly mistaken. How many of you have downloaded a movie and then saw it later at the theater? How many of you have downloaded and album and then purchased it to support the band?

Furthermore, potential loses are not theft. One can’t suggest that simply because a person illegally downloaded a piece of content they would have otherwise purchased it.

Stay tuned.

jared@zeropaid.com

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Un tribunal polonais a prononcé des peines allant d'un an et demi à deux ans et demi de prison pour le vol du frontispice de l'ancien camp nazi.

Dix étrangers condamnés. Le tribunal ordonne une expertise sur les causes du drame de Vincennes.

Elodie, jeune femme homosexuelle qui réclamait en 2004 un congé de paternité, a été déboutée de sa demande par la cour de cassation, qui approuve ainsi le tribunal de Nantes.

12h. Quelques personnes dans le grand hall qui dessert les salles d'audience. 12h30, arrivée dans le hall de l'avocate des plaignants (soit les flics du CRA qui se constitués partie civile dans l'affaire). Vers 12h45, des caméras et leurs porteurs arrivent dans le hall ainsi que les gendarmes. Il y a environ une quarantaine de personnes venues assister au jugement, dispersées entre la 16e chambre et la 31e. Un papier scotché à l'entrée des deux chambres indique que les audiences du matin qui doivent se dérouler dans la 16e chambre se tiendront dans la (...) Source: Antimollusques

par Sub lege libertas

Ce jeudi 18 mars à quinze heures, Madame Simone Veil sera reçue comme membre de l’Académie française pour y occuper le treizième fauteuil de cette compagnie.

Profitons au passage pour rappeler à la présidence de la République, que le terme d’« intronisation » employé dans son communiqué de 9 heures 46 pour désigner la réception « sous la Coupole » de Madame Simone Veil est impropre, sauf à y lire une certaine forme d’ironie involontaire ou déplacée. Comme protecteur de cette Compagnie, le Président de la République assistera donc à cette cérémonie de « réception » que ses services eussent été mieux inspirés de désigner par son nom. La maîtrise de la langue française s’impose lorsqu’on protège l’Académie dont le seul rôle officiel est de veiller sur elle.

Pourquoi Sub lege libertas sombre-t-il dans l’académisme ?

Pour saluer ici Simone Veil, magistrat, qui rejoint cette assemblée si singulière. Je n’ignore pas que la carrière dans la magistrature de la récipiendaire n’est pas à l’origine de son élection à l’Académie. Mais, je souligne qu’aucun magistrat de l’ordre judiciaire n’avait siégé à l’Académie française depuis André Dupin, élu en 1832 alors qu’il était Procureur Général près la Cour de cassation – André Dupin avait adopté comme devise personnelle lors de sa nomination à ce poste « sub lege libertas ». Lui non plus d’ailleurs ne devait son élection à son office de magistrat, mais comme Madame Simone Veil, à son parcours d’homme d’État.

Si le monde de la robe – et je ne parle pas ici du sexe de Madame Simone Veil, sixième femme à siéger quai Conti – était plus fréquemment représenté à l’Académie au XVIIe et XVIIIe siècle – citons le Baron de Montesquieu qui émerge de l’oubli avec Malesherbes, la tendance s’inversa par la suite. Au XXe siècle, si nous exceptons François Albert-Buisson qui fut magistrat consulaire et Président du Tribunal de commerce de Paris et Pierre Moinot qui fut procureur général près la Cour des comptes, seuls quelques avocats siégèrent à l’Académie française. Saluons notamment parmi eux, Maurice Garçon et Georges Izard, le premier car il fut l’incarnation de l’éloquence judiciaire ; le second car il fut des quatre-vingt députés qui, le 10 juillet 1940, refusèrent de voter les pleins pouvoirs au Maréchal Pétain. Aujourd’hui, Jean-Denis Bredin représente le Barreau dans cette docte assemblée.

Saluer la réception à l’Académie française du magistrat Simone Veil, c’est aussi une façon de rendre hommage à la femme et son parcours sans répéter ici les éloges convenus, quasi nécrologiques, lus çà et là. C’est aussi, à travers le kaléidoscope des portraits des 719 immortels qui siégèrent quai Conti, avoir un autre regard sur l’identité française qui fait qu’à cinq fauteuils du siège occupé par le Maréchal Pétain, siégera désormais Madame Simone Jacob épouse Veil déportée le 13 avril 1944 à Auschwitz-Birkenau en application de l’acte dit loi du 3 octobre 1940 portant statut des juifs promulgué par ledit Pétain.

Madame vous siégerez aussi sur le fauteuil jadis occupé par Jean Racine qui fit chanté à Esther :

Eh ! que reproche aux Juifs sa haine envenimée?
Quelle guerre intestine avons-nous allumée ?
Les a-t-on vu marcher parmi vos ennemis?
Fut-il jamais au joug esclaves plus soumis?

Madame, la robe que vous avez portée, votre histoire et vos combats vous font encore la digne héritière du Baron de Montesquieu au sein de cette Compagnie.

A votre immortalité !

News of deal overseen by Bishop of Derry adds to abuse scandals surrounding Catholic churches in Europe

The Catholic church in Ireland was today embroiled in another child abuse scandal after revelations that a victim was paid to keep quiet in a deal overseen by the Bishop of Derry.

Bishop Seamus Hegarty has been named among the defendants in an out-of-court settlement after an eight-year-old girl was abused by a priest for more than a decade.

The legal papers show that £12,000 was paid in compensation to the victim on condition that she kept the agreement confidential.

The settlement between the Archdiocese of Derry and the young woman, who was eight when the abuse, began, contained a silence clause preventing her from discussing the case.

Her ordeal began in 1979, lasting for a decade before she revealed, during her 18th birthday party, that she had been repeatedly abused by the priest.

He had been invited into the home by her parents, who had no idea he was a child abuser. He told her God would "punish" her if she spoke out about her ordeal.

After she spoke out, her family approached the diocese in Derry, and the victim claims the cleric was moved to another parish in the diocese despite meetings with Hegarty in 1994 during which he told her family he would deal with the problem.

In an interview with the Belfast Telegraph today, her family described Hegarty as neing "totally unsympathetic" during their initial meetings.

Her father said: "He just glared at me and scowled that this priest was seriously ill, as if I should feel pity for him. "

Despite reporting the allegations to Hegarty, the family say they found out the priest was in Derry and had access to other young girls.

Six years later, on 13 December 2000, a legal document was drawn up, naming Hegarty, along with Edward Daly and the victim, in an out-of-court settlement. The victim received £12,000, with a handwritten apology from the priest.

A spokesperson for Hegarty said: "They [the diocese] will not be making any comment until they have read the story fully and gone into the parish files and read all the details."

The scandal comes amid calls for national inquiries in Germany and Ireland to uncover the detail and extent of sexual abuse by priests.

With abuse allegations affecting Catholic churches across Europe, an Austrian priest today took the unusual step of criticising the pope, saying he should have take a stronger stance against abusers a long time ago.

Father Udo Fischer, who heads a parish in the lower Austrian village of Paudorf, said Jesus would "certainly not" have stayed silent and called on the pontiff to apologise and reform the church.

Yesterday, the head of Ireland's Catholics, Cardinal Sean Brady, apologised for his role in covering up abuse after admitting being present at two closed tribunals to discuss abuse allegations against Father Brendan Smyth.

Smyth died in prison while serving 12 years for 74 sexual assaults on children.

During those meetings, two children were made to sign an oath of silence to the Catholic church, stating that they would not talk about their claims with anybody other than a priest.

Brady is coming under increasing pressure to resign from his post as the most senior Catholic cleric in Ireland.

• Catholicism
• Ireland
• Religion

Henry McDonaldguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Alfredo Astiz a pris la parole pour la première fois au cours de son procès, mercredi 17 mars à Buenos Aires. Il a accusé le tribunal qui le juge pour des crimes commis pendant la dictature militaire (1976-1983), d'agir "sur ordre du pouvoir".

There's been something of a battle going on in the UK over news aggregators. Obviously, we've all heard about the various threats by companies like News Corp. in the US to sue Google over its Google News product, but a lot of this has already been playing out on a smaller scale in the UK. Last year we wrote about newspapers in the UK threatening aggregators like NewsNow, leading some to start blocking NewsNow crawlers. This is silly in the extreme. These aggregators offer links to the news. The "issue" with NewsNow is that it sells this as a service to companies -- and the newspapers claim they deserve a cut. Note that NewsNow provides just a link and a headline and the tiniest of blurbs. It's much less than even Google News provides. The newspapers seem to think that no one can profit from advertising their own stories unless they get a direct cut.

In fact, last year the NLA (Newspaper Licensing Association) in the UK decided to start charging all such services just for linking. This is, of course, ridiculous. One of the largest services of this type is called Meltwater News, and it decided to protest this ridiculous license on linking. It was joined in this effort by the Public Relations Consultants Association (PRCA), who noted that there is no copyright on headlines and links -- and the NLA's license amounted to an illegal tax. The NLA responded by saying that Meltwater and PRCA had no right to protest these licenses.

Earlier this week, however, the Copyright Tribunal in the UK ruled in favor of the PRCA and Meltwater in protesting these new licenses, and it ordered the NLA to pay the costs of both organizations. Now there will be a full trial concerning the legality of the licenses.

What's interesting, however, is that hours after this decision came out, the Times Online in the UK just so happened to update its robots.txt file to block Meltwater (along with NewsNow, who had already been blocked). Basically, it was a quiet threat: if you don't pay, we'll block you.

The newspapers are walking a very thin line here. They're trying to charge for the most basic element of the web: linking and sharing links with others. I would imagine that if they actually win this fight, they're going to end up regretting it even more -- because if they start linking to other sites themselves, how long will it take before those linked sites start demanding money back from the newspapers as well. It's an incredibly short-sited view that a newspaper takes to think that others must pay you to promote you.

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Microsoft vient d'essuyer un nouvel échec devant la justice puisqu'un tribunal du Texas a reconnu l'éditeur coupable de violation de brevets à l'encontre de VirnetX.VirnetX, qui commercialise des technologies de communications IP sécurisées, avait porté l'affaire devant la justice en février 2007.

Microsoft vient d'essuyer un nouvel échec devant la justice puisqu'un tribunal du Texas a reconnu l'éditeur coupable de violation de brevets à l'encontre de VirnetX.VirnetX, qui commercialise des technologies de communications IP sécurisées, avait porté l'affaire devant la justice en février 2007.

 En juillet 2006, un homme avait fauché sur l'A83 une employée de péage. Au tribunal, ce conducteur avait expliqué n'avoir pas réussi à désactiver le régulateur de vitesse de son véhicule.
Régulateur : l'auteur d'un accident mortel blanchi