From Abu Muqawama…..

Why was this story not reported from Afghanistan? Because it is well understood by the journalists who cover Afghanistan that reporting on the connection between Karzai and the drug trade is a good way to get you (the Western journalist) thrown out of the country and all your local staff either killed or thrown in prison. For quite some time now, major Western news sources have been struggling to figure out some way to both report the story while at the same time ensuring the safety of their local staffs. (Talk about ethical dilemmas…) The New York Times was the first to find the solution by filing a report that drew primarily upon sources within the DEA and the Department of State but not to a significant degree upon the reporting of its staff in Afghanistan. (Carlotta Gall only ‘contributed reporting’ from Kabul. For her part, she wins Abu Muqawama’s Team Player award for letting this story be filed under James Risen’s byline.)

This story got told because the people at New York Times really wanted it told. But a lot of stories are not told for very reasons that New York Times played games with its bylines. The threat of violence and prospect of losing access to key players has kept a lot of stories from the light of day for a long time.

From Fox News…

A British gardener’s local council has ordered him to remove a 3-foot high barbed wire fence around his property in case thieves hurt themselves on it, the Daily Mail reported Thursday.

Bill Malcolm, 61, installed the wire at his Worcester property after burglars robbed his tool shed and vegetable plots three times in four months, stealing more than $500 worth of hardware.

From the Washington Post…..

So what’s killing the Russians? All the usual suspects — HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, alcoholism, cancer, cardiovascular and circulatory diseases, suicides, smoking, traffic accidents — but they occur in alarmingly large numbers, and Moscow has neither the resources nor the will to stem the tide. Consider this:

Three times as many Russians die from heart-related illnesses as do Americans or Europeans, per each 100,000 people.

Tuberculosis deaths in Russia are about triple the World Health Organization’s definition of an epidemic, which is based on a new-case rate of 50 cases per 100,000 people.

Average alcohol consumption per capita is double the rate the WHO considers dangerous to one’s health.

About 1 million people in Russia have been diagnosed with HIV or AIDS, according to WHO estimates.

Using mid-year figures, it’s estimated that 25 percent more new HIV/AIDS cases will be recorded this year than were logged in 2007.

And none of this is likely to get better any time soon. Peter Piot, the head of UNAIDS, the U.N. agency created in response to the epidemic, told a press conference this summer that he is “very pessimistic about what is going on in Russia and Eastern Europe . . . where there is the least progress.” This should be all the more worrisome because young people are most at risk in Russia. In the United States and Western Europe, 70 percent of those with HIV/AIDS are men over age 30; in Russia, 80 percent of this group are aged 15 to 29.