Pelpita appointed as Ministry’s additional Sec. is culprit in Sil redhi case and is the accused in child molestation case.!

- Why wasn’t he interdicted despite these cases ? Dadalla and Gamini Seneviratne deserve punishment !

(Lanka-e-News -28.May.2016, 11.30PM)  The evil despicable troika  comprising Minister  of home affairs Vajira Abeywardane , Public service commission secretary J. Dallage and Public service commission secretary H.M. Gamini Seneviratne have  appointed Anusha Pelpita as the  additional secretary to the ministry of Home affairs while he is facing glaring criminal  charges in the colossal Sil redhi (cloth) fraud ,in addition to child molestation charges , based on reports reaching Lanka e news.

The colossal Sil redhi fraud involving a sum of Rs. 620 million was filed against Pelpita at the beginning of this year while his child molestation case was filed in February 2015. He was arrested on 26 th February in this molestation case , and is now out on bail.

Is Vajira Abeywardena a minister of good governance or a shameless lowliest grade stooge of the Rajapakse regime?

Superior officers Dadalla and Gamini Seneviratne who kept back in service such a scoundrel of an officer like Pelpita who has not one but two criminal cases against him without serving interdiction orders must themselves be interdicted on charges of dereliction and grave neglect of duties, and an investigation conducted against them.

The question whether Vajira Abeywardena is a minister of good governance or is a lowliest stooge of Rajapakse becomes  most pertinent when  the child molestation case against Pelpita comes to memory. Hereunder are the details..…….

When the pro good governance masses in their entirety were rallying around the common presidential candidate Maithripala Sirisena to make him victorious on 8 th January 2015, the lackeys and lickspittles of Rajapakse who had  a hunch they would lose floated a false malicious rumor on 1 st January 2015 that  Maithripala Sirisena abducted the child of a woman by the name of Kumari Dissanayake , and was  keeping him hidden. Those who are reading this news will certainly remember this false tale. The statement of the 14 year old boy supposedly the victim was also telecast via the ITN channel by Mahinda in order to malign and mudsling at Maithripala.

In truth this 14 years old boy  was abducted by his father who was separated from his mother. It were the soldiers of the PSD of Rajapakse at that time who helped the father in this crime. Sepala Ratnayake a close sidekick of Rajapakse who got around the father by payment of money , and hatched this conspiracy, and kept the child hidden in the official  flat given to Ratnayake  in a housing complex . It was Anusha Pelpita and Sudharman Radeliyagoda who made the video tape of the child’s statement and telecast it over the ITN.

After the victory of Maithripala however , the mother of the child lodged a complaint with the children  and women’s bureau, and while the investigation was being conducted , Ratnayake fled to England.(now  there is an Interpol warrant issued against him). As the child was of young age , the children and women’s bureau filed a case (No. 20203/15).There are 10 accused in this case , and the 9 th accused is none other than Anusha Pelpita the notorious scoundrel who is now appointed by Vajira Abeywardena as additional secretary of his ministry. Notorious Pelpita was taken into custody on 26 th February 2015 , and was released on bail. The  case is still on going.

It can be imagined therefore what a low bred minister should be  Vajira Abeywardena to select a rascal like Pelpita as the additional secretary to his  ministry  who stooped to such disgraceful and wicked levels to vilify and malign Maithripala Sirisena (Vajira’s presidential election candidate then ) ?

While Anusha Pelpita is having a criminal case pending against him over a year , that is from February 2015 , J. Dadallage the secretary of public administration ministry and H.M. Gamini Seneviratne the secretary of Public Service Commission by failing to serve interdiction order on Pelpita , and allowing him to continue working ,it is crystal clear  what a  grave offence and wrong  they have committed ? Aren’t they as responsible officers guilty of gross neglect and dereliction of their official  duties and punishable therefore? 

The specter of Rajapakse is still looming over  government of good governance . 

How the conspiracy came  to light in this case ….

The child molestation case aforementioned is being tried in Colombo -Hultsdorf magistrate court No.9 . Thilina Gamage the Elephant rogue who is these days gone into hiding became the judge of this court then.. Thereafter, hatching a conspiracy , the  Pilapitiyas tried to offer money through Thilina Gamage to the mother of that boy  referred to hereinbefore  in order to make her withdraw the case.

Unfortunately for the conspirators , owing to the intelligent approach of the state counsel who appeared on behalf of the Attorney General (AG ) , the conspiracy was foiled. The State counsel asked a  crucial question : When the aggrieved party is an under-aged boy , how can the mother withdraw the case? 

The most pertinent question is how come Pelpita who is charged with misusing colossal amount of public funds and has also a case of child molestation against him , is still not interdicted and is continuing in service ?

Certainly this grave lapse is unpardonable under any circumstances and what  provokes the pro good governance masses beyond anything they can bear . As their provocation and loss of patience are most justifiable of course, the evil  traitorous troika Vajira Abeywardena , Dadallage and Gamini Seneviratne cannot be allowed to defecate on the heads of 6.2 million voters just because these blokes know to defecate only on the roads along with the stray dogs– no , not for all the world !

It is being wondered why the independent public Commission too is  asleep at the wheel ?

The pro good governance masses simply remaining inside their homes after putting the cross in favor of government of good governance is absolutely unavailing – good governance cannot be given life by that. The people must consistently fight for good governance . The time is now ripe for that !

Connected news reports:

1.The PSC secretary who appointed Anusha Pelpita the Sil cloth racketeer as a ministry additional secretary is also a crook..!

2.Minister of home affairs Abeywardena pulls the wool over eyes of good governance government !

---------------------------
by     (2016-05-30 03:42:49)

Chief Minister should apologize unconditionally - SLMC Leader Rauf Hakeem

Sun, May 29, 2016

May 29, Colombo: The Chief Minister of Sri Lanka's Eastern Province Nazeer Ahamed, who humiliated a Sri Lanka Navy officer at a function in Sampur Maha Vidyalaya should apologize unconditionally, Minster Rauf Haleem, the leader of Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, which represents the Chief Minister, said.

The Chief Minister in a letter to the President and the Prime Minister expressed his view that both the Navy officer and he should apologize to each other.

Minister Hakeem, addressing an event in Kinniya, Trincomalee, said he the reasons that led to the altercation can be reviewed after the Chief Minister apologizes to the Navy officer, according to BBC Sinhala Service.

The Minister further said that certain elements take political advantage from these incidents and giving opportunities for such parties should be avoided.

"We should not get caught in the attempts of some parties ready to create rifts," Minister Hakeem said adding that there can be political motives behind such incidents.

The SLMC leader expressed hope that the President and the Prime Minister will take appropriate actions.

"We buried the demons during the last general election. We should find ways to not to let them resurrect," the Minister said.


As the leader of the Muslim Congress, he intervened to resolve this dispute focusing on the country's stability, and the dignity of the minorities, Mr. Hakeem said.

Decision to shun EP CM Ahamed countermanded Sampur incident: 

By Shamindra Ferdinando-May 30, 2016, 8:47 pm

The government has countermanded a decision taken by armed forces to boycott public events attended by Eastern Province Chief Minister Z.A. Nazeer Ahamed over an incident involving him and Captain I.R. Premaratne of Sri Lanka Navy at Sampur Maha Vidyalayam on May 20.

Alleging that CM Ahamed had humiliated Captain Premaratne, Commanding Officer of SLN base at Sampur, the Defence Ministry late last week announced an unprecedented decision to shun SLMC politician.

The SLMC is a constituent of the UNP-led coalition. Ahamed heads EP Provincial Administration comprising the UNP, SLFP, TNA as well as the SLMC.

CM Ahamed told The Island last night that he appreciated the government intervention. Ahamed said that he deeply regretted the incident though the military response couldn’t be accepted.

The government has also revoked decision taken by the military to prevent CM Ahamed from entering security forces establishments.

In a May 27 letter to President Maitripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, CM Ahamed strongly condemned the decision taken by the security forces to boycott events attended by him.

The government issued fresh instructions in respect of the Defence Ministry’s intervention following consultations between President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe. Well informed sources told The Island that the government felt the Sampur incident couldn’t be allowed to jeopardise what ministerial sources described as vital political arrangement in the East.

As Lanka e news warned so it is happening ! Kanishka to the fore to save judge Thilina the Elephant rogue !!

(Lanka-e-News -28.May.2016, 11.30PM)  As Lanka e news warned  in its report yesterday (27) under the caption   “Robber-judge Thilina Gamage the most wanted Elephant rogue tramples the laws and flees! -wherever you see him apprehend and hand over to CID !”  so it has happened ! 

Kanishka Wjeratne the Gangodawila court magistrate who is a bosom pal of robber judge Thilina Gamage the notorious  Elephant rogue is to hear the case of Thilina casting away   the lofty traditions of court and ethical practices into the dustbin, based on reports .

This deplorable and despicable action of Kanishka revolves around  the anticipatory bail application made by the lawyers of robber judge Thilina Gamage the shameless Elephant rogue who pulled the wool over the very eyes of the law despite being  a judge who is  duty  bound to protect the sacred laws of the country. Kanishka has accepted that bail application for hearing on Monday(30).

First and foremost ,holding captive an elephant without a license is an offence coming under the Public property Act and is hence non bailable. A judgment delivered by a five judge bench including former chief justice Shiranee Bandaranaike clearly underlines this.

In such circumstances , even considering an anticipatory bail application is not permissible , yet Kanishka the bosom pal of elephant rogue Thilina has deemed it right and fixed the date of hearing for next Monday.

In the earlier news report of Lanka e news we  revealed, at the conference on intellectual property held at the Judicial Institute on the 25 th , because Kanishka Wijeratne who was present had publicly announced the method regarding granting bail to Thilina , and Kanishka being Thilina’s bosom pal ,  Kanishka  should steer clear of that case on ethical and moral grounds , based on legal traditions , as pointed out by a spokesman of the Magistrates’ association  .

On the contrary , unheeding the lofty legal traditions and ethical practices , Kanishka has come forward to turn the law and legal norms upside down unlawfully .

It is best if Kanishka understands , this   is unlike  a political deal that  can be turned and twisted in whatever way for sordid reasons .On the contrary   this involves the independent  judiciary and the sacrosanct judgment of a court to be delivered by a judge most cautiously,  dispassionately and impartially .In spite of that  Kanishka even while being  a judge had chosen the erroneous path recklessly which  erodes the faith the people repose  in the courts , when  Kanishka’s sacred duty as a judge is taking measures to boost the confidence and trust of the people in the sacrosanct judicial sphere . Surely , in a law court none can conduct himself/herself  as in a  tennis court , and least of all a judge cannot play the role of  a playmate of a child in the  tennis court ! If that is going to be the stupid and disgraceful level the courts are going to descend , the people cannot be blamed if they start taking  the law into their hands .

Connected report…
'Robber-judge Thilina Gamage the most wanted Elephant rogue tramples the laws and flees! -Wherever you see him apprehend and hand over to CID !' 

---------------------------
by     (2016-05-29 23:04:22)

Another murder involvement by Anura Senanayake revealed!

May 30, 2016

A senior SP has revealed to the CID details of another murder committed with the involvement of retired senior DIG Anura Senanayake, presently in remand custody, when he was the senior DIG in charge of Colombo.  Two brothers of a Tamil family living in Bambalapitiya had been in a dispute and one had given a contract to kill the other, for which Senanayake had given protection of the police.

The senior SP, who investigated the killing, had volunteered information to the CID, as to how Senanayake had influenced him during the investigation. He has gone to the CID soon after Senanayake was sent to remand custody and revealed everything. The CID is now investigating the matter.

 

‘Divaina’ in contract to make war hero out of Senanayake

 

Meanwhile, yesterday’s ‘Divaina Irida Sangrahaya’ has published an interview with Senanayake conducted by its unofficial editor Saman Gamage, in an attempt to make war heroes out of murderers. This Gamage came to ‘Divaina’ to make tea, but became a writer due to his patriotism and is now making war heroes out of murderers and denouncing the CID.

 

In the interview, Senanayake says, “Gotabhaya told me to attack the LTTE. Attack the underworld.” Commenting on this, a top police official told us, “Gotabhaya might have said so. But, what Anura Senanayake did was to swindle. He still continues to do so.”

 

The police official also said, “The only help Anura Senanayake could get now is to become a patriot with ‘Divaina’s support and escape his sins.”

 

Up next is how Anura Senanayake got caught obtaining bribes from the dust tea mafia….

PM's Additional Secretary's arrest stalled

MONDAY, 30 MAY 2016

It is reported that the exercise by the FCID to arrest Mrs. Hema Premawardene, an Additional Secretary to the Prime Minister, last Thursday had to be abandoned due to interference by a political stalwart state reports.

She held a responsible position in the tourist development process implemented under  former Minister Basil Rajapaksa's Ministry of Economic Development during the previous regime and was accused of misappropriating a sum of more than Rs.7 million.

The initial investigations regarding this crime was carried out by Anti Corruption Committee Secretariat and handed over to FCID to continue investigations. It is said that the investigations were completed and the file was sent to Attorney General's Department and Attorney General has approved her  arrest.

Meanwhile, Attorney General has given permission to arrest 6 officials in Tourism Development Authority including its Chairman. However, these arrests too have been stopped due to the political interference mentioned above.

The Anti Corruption Committee Secretariat has referred 182 files received by it on large scale financial frauds and corruption to FCID of which 42 files have been referred to the Attorney General by the FCID say reports.

Palestinians to form ‘protection committees’ against Israeli settler violence
 A new project will seek to connect isolated Palestinian villagers to establish committees for documenting settler rights violations

Palestinian Fatima speaks to an audience of villlagers in Imnezel (MEE)-Yousef speaks to the Hebron governor about a lack of services in his village (MEE) 

24 year old Sawsan lives in cave after her family home was demolished (MEE) - Hebron Governor Kamel Hemeid (MEE)

Monday 30 May 2016

Nearly 200 members of the most isolated and under threat Palestinian communities living in the occupied West Bank came together on Monday for the launch of a new project aimed at establishing “protection committees” to document Israeli human rights violations.

Community leaders and families from villages across the governorates of Hebron and Bethlehem met at a school in the tiny poverty stricken village of Imnezel, which is surrounded by Israeli settlements filled with new and luxurious homes deemed illegal under international law.

Sheltered from the hot sun by a beige tarpaulin in a makeshift marquee, Palestinians welcomed the launch of a new three-year project by international aid agency ActionAid, which will see the formation of local community protection committees that will document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Hebron Governor Kamel Hemeid was at the event and he said that it was “important” to support projects that seek to equip Palestinians with the ability to properly document Israeli settler violence.

Many of the Palestinians who attended the event hailed from small villages where they are not only under threat from ever expanding Israeli settlements but they also suffer from a lack of access to electricity, water, transportation and medical care.

All of them live in Area C, which makes up around 62 percent of the West Bank and is under the full control of Israeli authorities.

ActionAid’s West Bank Programme Manager Ibrahim Ibraigheth told Middle East Eye that Palestinians living in Area C require assistance in making connections with each other as they are often isolated in distant villages.

“All the potential economic development for the Palestinian people is located in Area C and it contains the only way for a future Palestinian state to be able to survive,” he said. “Part of the occupation is to isolate each community.

“We will bring these communities together to create internal solidarity and enable them to raise their voices.”

The project will educate community leaders about human rights and international law allowing them, Ibraigheth said, to document human rights violations with “solid evidence”.

“We will take this evidence to all stakeholders beginning with the Palestinian Authority, going on to international human rights organisations, and hopefully ending with the United Nations.”

Six of the seven Hebron communities who attended do not have access to water or electricity, while the five Bethlehem communities explained how they live under the constant threat of violence from nearby Israeli settlers.  

One of the community leaders who attended on Monday was Sawsan, a 24-year-old university graduate from the small village of El Mfagra in the south of the Hebron governorate.

Sawsan gave an impassioned speech about how she had faced stiff challenges over the past several years, after Israeli authorities unceremonially demolished her family home in 2011.

Sawsan said she was held in prison for 10 days by Israeli authorities for protesting her home’s demolition, adding that for the past five years her family has been forced to live in a cave that only has access to electricity through solar panels donated by Israeli rights group B’Tselem.

Sawsan is now a committed activist determined to raise the voice of her community, and she said she was excited by the prospect of being part of ActionAid’s plan to set up protection committees so people can know “the truth” about how it is to live in her village.

“It is up to me to fix our situation,” she said. “If I don’t do it no one will.

“Israel want us to leave our land but we will never do this – it is my right to stay here.”

Despite it being a Palestinian village in the middle of desolate farmland, the roads leading up to Imnezel are lined with Israeli flags on every lamppost, and there is an ever-present feeling that settlements are nearby.

Fatima, whose village in Bethlehem is surrounded by settlements, said Palestinians feel under constant threat from Israeli settlers.

“It’s never safe,” she said. “They are always threatening us and burning or taking our land. We are farmers and the soldiers sometimes block us from collecting our crops – so they go bad and are left to rot.”

Fatima is an imposing mother of five, who has had one son killed in clashes with Israeli soldiers and another one imprisoned. She exudes the authority of a woman who commands the respect of her peers, and she is clear that her being a woman is of central importance to her community leadership.

“Palestinian women are more important than the men,” she said. “We are on the front line facing up to the settlers, and we have to protect ourselves.”

Two common themes dominated the morning’s event. Those meeting for the first time shared messages of solidarity that gave hope for new connections and solidarity across communities, while similar concerns of a lack of services were consistently raised by most of the speakers.

Yousef, an elderly man from Um al-Darraj village in south Hebron, questioned Hemeid on why his village has few transportation links and poor access to medical care, and called on him to provide financial support for young people wanting to go to university but who are unable to afford the fees.

“We will make 100-percent effort to provide for all the needs of everyone in your villages,” Hemeid told the audience. “We will never allow a poor student not to go to university.

“And we will provide all legal support necessary against any Israeli aggressions,” he added, before leaving along with his Palestinian police escort.

Yousef told MEE that he didn’t want to argue with Hemeid but that he would follow up to see if he would deliver on his promise that all villages would get access to the services they need.

As the event came to a close, Yousef walked over to Sawsan, and, while passing prayer beads through his fingers, he said that the day had given him hope that marginalised Palestinian villagers may work together to have a stronger voice in the future.

“Poverty is a virus and for us villagers we suffer it the most,” he said. “But if we can build on today and work together perhaps we can see the day when we will have what we need to live on our land in peace.”

All those interviewed asked only to be identified by their first names in order to protect their anonymity. 

Israel cancels release, charges astrophysicist

Imad Barghouti (via Facebook)

Ali Abunimah-29 May 2016

Israeli military prosecutors have filed “incitement” charges against Professor Imad Barghouthi, the Palestinian astrophysicist held in administrative detention since 24 April, who was due to be released on Sunday.

Barghouthi’s case has attracted growing global attention, especially from concerned fellow scientists.

The Palestinian Prisoners Club said in a statement on Sunday that Israeli occupation forces had canceled Barghouthi’s expected release after military prosecutors filed charges over statements the Al-Quds University professor allegedly made on Facebook.

Jawad Boulos, a lawyer from the Palestinian Prisoners Club, described the latest Israeli move as “shameless.”

“Absurd”

In a rare victory last Thursday, an Israeli military court had granted Barghouthi’s demand to be released from administrative detention – prolonged, indefinitely renewable imprisonment without charge or trial.

But the victory was short lived.

Boulos said the decision to charge Barghouthi now was “absurd” given what had happened at Thursday’s hearing.

Boulos said the Israeli military prosecutor had told the military judge that he had examined Barghouthi’s file and found insufficient evidence to charge him.

It was on that basis that the prosecutor had asked the military judge to extend Barghouthi’s administrative detention, which the military court refused to do.

Boulos said that Barghouthi’s case “demonstrates to anyone who still needs proof that all of the ‘legal’ procedures established by the occupation forces … are flimsy and fake and give no heed to legal principles.”

“We confirm that all these measures have no aim but to repress the Palestinian by any means or excuse to keep him behind bars,” Boulos added.

Last week, the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem announced it would end a decades-long policy of cooperating with the military justice system, saying it was nothing more than a fig leaf to legitimize the occupation.

Prisoner rights group Addameer estimates that 750 Palestinians are currently detained indefinitely by Israel without charge or trial.

Global outcry

During last week’s appeal, Boulos submitted a petition signed by academics from all over the world urging Barghouthi’s release.

Another letter delivered to the Israeli prime minister’s office was signed by more than 350 international scholars, many at the top of mathematics and science fields.

Among the prominent signatories are David Mumford, winner of the 1974 Fields Medal, often called the Nobel Prize of mathematics; leading physicist Freeman Dyson of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and Chandler Davis, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics at the University of Toronto.

Other academic signatories include Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler and Angela Davis.

This is the second time occupation forces have detained Barghouthi after he criticized Israel online.

In December 2014, Barghouthi was arrested for comments he made on Facebook and on television.

Bangladesh panel finds possible insider role in central bank cyber theft

The SWIFT logo is pictured in this photo illustration taken April 26, 2016.REUTERS/CARLO ALLEGRI/ILLUSTRATION/FILE PHOTO

Mon May 30, 2016

Officials of Bangladesh Bank may have been involved in a brazen theft of $81 million from its account with the New York Federal Reserve Bank in February, the head of a government-appointed panel investigating the cyber heist told reporters on Monday.

Hackers broke into the computer systems of the Bangladesh central bank and issued instructions through the SWIFT network to transfer $951 million of its deposits held at the New York Federal Reserve Bank to accounts in the Philippines and Sri Lanka.

Most of the transactions were blocked but four went through, amounting to $81 million, sparking allegations by Bangladeshi officials that both the Fed and SWIFT had failed to detect the fraud.

"Earlier we thought no one from Bangladesh Bank was involved, but now there is a small change," 

Mohammed Farashuddin, a former governor of the Bangladesh central bank, said, after handing his final report to the finance minister.

He declined to say what the change was.

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith said the report would be made public in 15 to 20 days.

Farashuddin declined to provide details of the report, but said its findings were different from a previous one that mainly held SWIFT, the international banking payments network, responsible for one of the world's biggest cyber thefts.

He reiterated that SWIFT could not avoid responsibility, however. He has earlier said SWIFT made a number of mistakes in connecting up a local network in Dhaka, the Bangladeshi capital.

SWIFT has denied the accusations.

Bangladesh Bank spokesman Subhankar Saha said its officials had yet to read the report or receive government instructions.

"The Bangladesh Bank management will follow all instructions given by the government," Saha told Reuters. "Actions will be taken as per instruction by the government if any central bank officials were found guilty."

(Reporting by Krishna N. Das and Ruma Paul; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

These 25 Companies Are More Powerful Than Many Countries

Going stateless to maximize profits, multinational companies are vying with governments for global power. Who is winning?

BY PARAG KHANNA- March 17

TOP 25 BY DAVID FRANCIS

ILLUSTRATION BY EDEL RODRIGUEZ

At first glance, the story of Accenture reads like the archetype of the American dream. One of the world’s biggest consulting companies, which commands tens of billions of dollars in annual revenues, was born in the 1950s as a small division of accounting firm Arthur Andersen. Its first major project was advising General Electric to install a computer at a Kentucky facility in order to automate payment processing. Several decades of growth followed, and by 1989, the division was successful enough to become its own organization: Andersen Consulting.

Yet a deeper look at the business shows its ascent veering off the American track. This wasn’t because it opened foreign offices in Mexico, Japan, and other countries; international expansion is pro forma for many U.S. companies. Rather, Andersen Consulting saw benefits—fewer taxes, cheaper labor, less onerous regulations — beyond borders and restructured internally to take advantage of them. By 2001, when it went public after adopting the name Accenture, it had morphed into a network of franchises loosely coordinated out of a Swiss holding company. It incorporated in Bermuda and stayed there until 2009, when it redomiciled in Ireland, another low-tax jurisdiction. Today, Accenture’s roughly 373,000 employees are scattered across more than 200 cities in 55 countries. Consultants parachute into locations for commissioned work but often report to offices in regional hubs, such as Prague and Dubai, with lower tax rates. To avoid pesky residency status, the human resources department ensures that employees don’t spend too much time at their project sites.

Welcome to the age of metanationals: companies that, like Accenture, are effectively stateless. When business and strategy experts Yves Doz, José Santos, and Peter Williamson coined the term in a 2001 book, metanationals were an emerging phenomenon, a divergence from the tradition of corporations taking pride in their national roots. (In the 1950s, General Motors President Charles Wilson famously said, “What was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa.”) Today, the severing of state lifelines has become business as usual.

ExxonMobil, Unilever, BlackRock, HSBC, DHL, Visa—these companies all choose locations for personnel, factories, executive suites, or bank accounts based on where regulations are friendly, resources abundant, and connectivity seamless. Clever metanationals often have legal domicile in one country, corporate management in another, financial assets in a third, and administrative staff spread over several more. Some of the largest American-born firms — GE, IBM, Microsoft, to name a few — collectively are holding trillions of dollars tax-free offshore by having revenues from overseas markets paid to holding companies incorporated in Switzerland, Luxembourg, the Cayman Islands, or Singapore. In a nice illustration of the tension this trend creates with policymakers, some observers have dubbed the money “stateless income,” while U.S. President Barack Obama has called the companies hoarding it America’s “corporate deserters.”

It isn’t surprising, of course, when companies find new ways to act in their own interest; it’s surprising when they don’t. The rise of metanationals, however, isn’t just about new ways of making money. It also unsettles the definition of “global superpower.”

The debate over that term usually focuses on states—that is, can any country compete with America’s status and influence? In June 2015, the Pew Research Center surveyed people in 40 countries and found that a median of 48 percent thought China had or would surpass the United States as a superpower, while just 35 percent said it never would. Pew, however, might have considered widening its scope of research — for corporations are likely to overtake all states in terms of clout.

Already, the cash that Apple has on hand exceeds the GDPs of two-thirds of the world’s countries. Firms are also setting the pace vis-à-vis government regulators in a perennial game of cat-and-mouse. After the 2008 financial crisis, the U.S. Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act to discourage banks from growing excessively big and catastrophe-prone. Yet while the law crushed some smaller financial institutions, the largest banks — with operations spread across many countries — actually became even larger, amassing more capital and lending less. Today, the 10 biggest banks still control almost 50 percent of assets under management worldwide. Meanwhile, some European Union officials, including Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, are pushing for a common tax-base policy among member states to prevent corporations from taking advantage of preferential rates. But if that happened (and it’s a very big if), firms would just look beyond the continent for metanational opportunities.

The world is entering an era in which the most powerful law is not that of sovereignty but that of supply and demand. As scholar Gary Gereffi of Duke University has argued, denationalization now involves companies assembling the capacities of various locations into their global value chains. This has birthed success for companies, such as commodities trader Glencore and logistics firm Archer Daniels Midland, that don’t focus primarily on manufacturing goods, but are experts at getting the physical ingredients of what metanationals make wherever they’re needed.

Could businesses go a step further, shifting from stateless to virtual? Some people think so. In 2013, Balaji Srinivasan, now a partner at the venture-capital company Andreessen Horowitz, gave a much debated talk in which he claimed Silicon Valley is becoming more powerful than Wall Street and the U.S. government. He described “Silicon Valley’s ultimate exit,” or the creation of “an opt-in society, ultimately outside the U.S., run by technology.” The idea is that because social communities increasingly exist online, businesses and their operations might move entirely into the cloud.

Much as the notion of taxing a metanational based on its headquarters’ location now seems painfully antiquated, Srinivasan’s ultimate exit may ring of techie utopianism. If stateless companies live by one rule, however, it’s that there’s always another place to go where profits are higher, oversight friendlier, and opportunities more plentiful. This belief has helped nimble, mobile, and smart corporations outgrow their original masters, including the world’s reigning superpower. Seen in this light, metanationals disassociating from terrestrial restraints and harnessing the power of the cloud is anything but far-fetched. It may even be inevitable.

The Top 25 Corporate Nations

BY DAVID FRANCIS

Eric Holder says Edward Snowden performed 'public service' with NSA leak

Former attorney general gives whistleblower credit for starting debate over surveillance – but says Snowden should still be punished

Edward Snowden appears on a live video feed broadcast from Moscow at a 2015 event. Photograph: Marco Garcia/AP

Amanda Holpuch in New York-Monday 30 May 2016

The former US attorney general Eric Holder has said the National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden performed a “public service” by starting a debate over government surveillance techniques.

Speaking on a podcast hosted by David Axelrod, a former campaign strategist for Barack Obama, Holder emphasized, however, that Snowden must still be punished.

“We can certainly argue about the way in which Snowden did what he did, but I think that he actually performed a public service by raising the debate that we engaged in and by the changes that we made,” 

Holder said, in an hourlong discussion on The Axe Files.

“Now, I would say that doing what he did – and the way he did it – was inappropriate and illegal.”

In June 2013, in one of the biggest document leaks in American history, Snowden revealed to media outlets including the Guardian that the NSA conducted indiscriminate bulk surveillance of US citizens. 

The agency said this mass data collection had been kept secret in order to protect Americans.

Holder, who led the justice department during the document leak, said Snowden “harmed American interests” by releasing the files.

“I know there are ways in which certain of our agents were put at risk, relationships with other countries were harmed, our ability to keep the American people safe was compromised,” Holder told Axelrod.

“There were all kinds of re-dos that had to be put in place as a result of what he did, and while those things were being done, we were blind in certain really critical areas. So what he did was not without consequence.”

Though Holder said Snowden should return to the US to face trial, he added that any judge who tried him should account for his contribution to the debate about mass surveillance.

“I think in deciding what an appropriate sentence should be, I think a judge could take into account the usefulness of having had that national debate,” Holder said.

Snowden has said repeatedly that he would return to the US if he could get a fair trial.

“But, as I think you’re quite familiar, the Espionage Act does not permit a public interest defense,” 

Snowden told a University of Chicago event earlier this month. “You’re not allowed to speak the word ‘whistleblower’ at trial.”

Snowden, who was a contractor for the NSA, has lived in Russia in the years following the leaks. Russia first granted him temporary asylum, then in 2014 gave him a three-year residency.

The frontrunners in the 2016 presidential race, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, have said Snowden should be punished, though they disagree in how serious that punishment should be.

In a Democratic debate in October, Clinton said Snowden should return and be put on trial. Bernie Sanders, now the only other Democratic contender, agreed, though he said he thought Snowden “played a very important role in educating the American public”.

In 2013, Trump implied that Snowden should be executed. In March, he said the US should get Snowden back from Russia because he is a spy. The Kremlin said it would not entertain such a plan.

View image on Twitter

 Follow

Glenn Greenwald 

✔‎@ggreenwald

People so often become honest and candid only once they leave government http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/30/politics/axe-files-axelrod-eric-holder/index.html …

7:55 AM - 30 May 2016

 
•  1,6561,656 Retweets
 
•  2,3652,365 likes

Holder has shown some leniency toward Snowden before, but his use of the phrase “public service” turned heads.

In January 2014, Holder told an audience at the University of Virginia that the government could accept a plea deal with Snowden if he were to return to the US and plead guilty to criminal charges.

He reiterated the possibility of a plea deal last year, after stepping down from his post as the country’s top law enforcement officer in April 2015 and returning to private practice with the Washington law firm Covington & Burling.

“I certainly think there could be a basis for a resolution that everybody could ultimately be satisfied with,” Holder told Yahoo News in July 2015. He added that the disclosures “spurred a necessary debate”.

Snowden did not immediately comment on Holder’s latest statement, though he did retweet a message posted by Glenn Greenwald, a journalist, now at the Intercept, to whom Snowden leaked the NSA documents.

Next to a screenshot of a CNN headline depicting Holder’s comments, the former Guardian columnist wrote: “People so often become honest and candid only once they leave government.”