Local News (Part 2)

Three men are to appear in court in connection with the theft of Gladys Hammond's body. Arrests have been made before during the campaign of intimidation in this part of rural Staffordshire, but I don't know if has ever got as far as people being prosecuted. It's amazing how coverage by the national media concentrates the minds of the police.

C4 News (Thursday), reporting on another case of a firm that has been terrorized into severing contacts with Huntingdon Life Sciences, contrasted the ineffectiveness of the laws to deal with animal rights extremists with the use of the anti-terrorism legislation on an 82 year old man who heckled at the Labour Party conference (he was detained in a particular place for about 5 minutes, as far as I can make out).

(By the way, congratulations to Alex Thompson for his report on a trip to Northern Afghanistan with ISAF: guess what, things are still pretty grim, but much better than under the Taliban.)

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An a propos on the attempts by migrants from Morocco to enter territory controlled by Spain: relations between the two countries seem to have improved since the 'Parsley Island' affair. I think that was in 2003, before Zapatero gained power.