Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties. Where extradition is compelled by laws, such as among sub-national jurisdictions, the concept may be known more generally as rendition.

Extradition treaties or agreements

The consensus in international law is that a state does not have any obligation to surrender an alleged criminal to a foreign state as one principle of sovereignty is that every state has legal authority over the people within its borders. Such absence of international obligation and the desire of the right to demand such criminals of other countries have caused a web of extradition treaties or agreements to evolve; most countries in the world have signed bilateral extradition treaties with most other countries.

No country in the world has an extradition treaty with all other countries; for example, the United States lacks extradition treaties with several nations, including the People's Republic of China, Namibia, the United Arab Emirates, North Korea, and Bahrain.

Bars to extradition

By enacting laws or concluding treaties or agreements, countries determine the conditions under which they may entertain or deny extradition requests. Common bars to extradition include:

Failure to fulfill dual criminality - generally the act for which extradition is sought must constitute a crime punishable by some minimum penalty in both the requesting and the requested parties.

Political nature of the alleged crime - most countries refuse to extradite suspects of political crimes.

Possibility of certain forms of punishment - some countries refuse extradition on grounds that the person, if extradited, may receive capital punishment or face torture. A few go as far as to cover all punishments that they themselves would not administer.

Jurisdiction - Jurisdiction over a crime can be invoked to refuse extradition. In particular, the fact that the person in question is a nation's own citizen causes that country to have jurisdiction.

Own nationals - Some countries, such as France, Germany, Russia, Austria, the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan) and Japan, forbid extradition of their own nationals. These countries often have laws in place that give them jurisdiction over crimes committed abroad by or against citizens. By virtue of such jurisdiction, they prosecute and try citizens accused of crimes committed abroad as if the crime had occurred within the country's borders. Some nations refuse to extradite their own citizens, holding trials for the persons themselves (see e.g. trial of Xiao Zhen). Death penalty - Many countries, such as Australia, Canada, Macao, Mexico, and most European nations, will not allow extradition if the death penalty may be imposed on the suspect unless they are assured that the death sentence will not be passed or carried out.

Torture, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment - Many countries will not extradite if there is a risk that a requested person will be subjected to torture, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. In the case of ''Soering v United Kingdom'', the European Court of Human Rights held that it would violate Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights to extradite a person to the United States from the United Kingdom in a capital case. This was due to the harsh conditions on death row and the uncertain timescale within which the sentence would be executed.

Controversies

International tensions

The refusal of a country to extradite suspects or criminals to another may lead to international relations being strained. Often, the country to which extradition is refused will accuse the other country of refusing extradition for political reasons (regardless of whether or not this is justified). A case in point is that of Ira Einhorn, in which some US commentators pressured President Jacques Chirac of France, who does not intervene in legal cases, to permit extradition when the case was held up due to differences between French and American human rights law. Another long-standing example is Roman Polanski whose extradition the State of California has pursued for over 20 years. For a brief period he was placed under arrest in Switzerland, however subsequent legal appeals there prevented extradition.

The questions involved are often complex when the country from which suspects are to be extradited is a democratic country with a rule of law. Typically, in such countries, the final decision to extradite lies with the national executive (prime minister, president or equivalent). However, such countries typically allow extradition defendants recourse to the law, with multiple appeals. These may significantly slow down procedures. On the one hand, this may lead to unwarranted international difficulties, as the public, politicians and journalists from the requesting country will ask their executive to put pressure on the executive of the country from which extradition is to take place, while that executive may not in fact have the authority to deport the suspect or criminal on their own. On the other hand, certain delays, or the unwillingness of the local prosecution authorities to present a good extradition case before the court on behalf of the requesting state, may possibly result from the unwillingness of the country's executive to extradite.

For example, there is at present a disagreement between the United States and the United Kingdom about the Extradition Act 2003 (text here) that dispenses with the need for a ''prima facie'' case for extradition.

This came to a head over the extradition of the Natwest Three from the UK to the U.S., for their alleged role in the Enron fraud. Several British political leaders were heavily critical of the British government's handling of the issue. The former leader of the UK's Liberal Democrat party, Sir Menzies Campbell, had argued that the U.S. had not ratified the treaty primarily due to the influence of what he calls the "Irish lobby" – which, he said, is opposed to the treaty because it could make it easier for Britain to have alleged IRA terrorist suspects extradited from the U.S.

The precedent of the Natwest Three may also be used to extradite/prosecute Philip Watts in connection with the Royal Dutch Shell reserves scandal. The press has carried vocal criticisms of the present extradition arrangements from the UK's business community, some of whom stated that they were avoiding doing business with or in the U.S. because of legal concerns such as the extradition treaty, among other concerns.

===Extradition and abduction=== Issues of international law relating to extradition have proven controversial in cases where a state has abducted and removed an individual from the territory of another state without previously requesting permission, or following normal extradition procedures. Such abductions are usually in violation of the domestic law of the country in which they occur, as infringements of laws forbidding kidnapping. Many also regard abduction as violation of international law — in particular of a prohibition on arbitrary detention. A small number of countries have been reported to use kidnapping to circumvent the formal extradition process. Notable or controversial cases include the abduction of

{|class="wikitable sortable" |+ ! Year ! Name ! From ! To |- | 1950 | Morton Sobell | Mexico | United States |- | 1960 | Adolf Eichmann | Argentina | Israel |- | 1967 | Isang Yun | West Germany | South Korea |- | 1986 | Mordechai Vanunu | Italy | Israel |- | 1990 | Humberto Álvarez Machaín | Mexico | United States |- | 1997 | Aimal Kasi | Pakistan | United States |- | 1999 | Abdullah Ocalan | Kenya | United States, Turkey |- | 2002 | Martin Mubanga | Zambia | United States, Guantanamo Bay |- | 2004 | Khaled El-Masri | Republic of Macedonia | United States |- | 2005 | Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr | Italy | United States, Egypt |- | 2009 | Camilla Broe | Denmark | United States |- | 2011 | Dirar Abu Seesi | Ukraine | Israel |}

'Extraordinary rendition'

"Extraordinary rendition" is an extrajudicial procedure and policy of the United States in which criminal suspects, generally suspected terrorists or supporters of terrorist organisations, are sent to other countries for imprisonment and interrogation. The procedure differs from extradition as the purpose of the rendition is to extract information from suspects, while extradition is used to return fugitives so that they can stand trial or fulfill their sentence. Critics of the procedure have accused the CIA of rendering suspects to other countries in order to circumvent U.S. laws prescribing due process and prohibiting torture.

See also

Extraterritorial jurisdiction

Extraterritoriality

Universal jurisdiction

Right of asylum

Deportation

International:

Extradition law in the United States

Extradition law in Australia

European Arrest Warrant

Individuals:

Brian O'Rourke (1540?–1591), first man to be extradited within Britain.

Luis Posada Carriles, anti-Castrist detained in the U.S. and wanted by Cuba and Venezuela

Footnote

External links

''Extradition Lawyers' Association''

UN list of extradition information by country (1996)

A Brief Primer on International Law With cases and commentary. Nathaniel Burney, 2007.

Extraditions Cut Short - Extraditions between Colombia and United States

Chiquita Board Members: Total Identification - Extradition of Chiquita Board Members

International Extradition: New Jersey & Other States

Expulsions and extraditions, factsheet of the ECtHR case law

Category:International law Category:Criminal law Category:Court orders

be-x-old:Экстрадыцыя cs:Vydávání (extradice) cy:Estraddodiad de:Auslieferung (Recht) el:Έκδοση εγκληματία es:Extradición eo:Ekstradicio fa:بازداد fr:Extradition ga:Eiseachadadh ko:범죄인 인도 hr:Izručenje id:Ekstradisi it:Estradizione he:הסכם הסגרה ka:ექსტრადიცია lt:Ekstradicija arz:تسليم المجرمين ms:Ekstradisi nl:Uitleveringsverdrag ja:犯罪人引渡し条約 pl:Ekstradycja pt:Extradição ro:Extrădare ru:Экстрадиция sr:Екстрадиција sh:Izručenje fi:Rikoksen johdosta tapahtuva luovuttaminen sv:Utlämning uk:Екстрадиція zh:引渡法

Ice cubes are small, roughly cube-shaped pieces of ice, conventionally used to cool beverages. Ice cubes are sometimes preferred over crushed ice because they melt more slowly; they are standard in mixed drinks that call for ice, in which case the drink is said to be "on the rocks."

Ice cubes that are crushed or sheared into irregularly-shaped flakes may add an interesting aesthetic effect to some cocktails. Crushed ice is also used when faster cooling is desired, since the rate of cooling is governed by the number and average radius of the ice particles.

Melting ice cubes sometimes precipitate white flakes, commonly known as "floaties". This is calcium carbonate which is present in many water supplies and is completely harmless.

Origin

American physician and humanitarian John Gorrie built a refrigerator in 1844 with the purpose of cooling air. His refrigerator produced ice which he hung from the ceiling in a basin. Gorrie can be considered the creator of ice cubes, but his aim was not to cool drinks: he used the ice to lower the ambient room temperature. During his time, a dominant idea was that bad air quality caused disease. Therefore, in order to help treat sickness, he pushed for the draining of swamps and the cooling of sickrooms.

Methods of production

Ice cubes are produced domestically by filling an ice cube tray with water and placing it in a freezer. Many freezers also come equipped with an icemaker, which produces ice cubes automatically and stores them in a bin from which they can be dispensed directly into a glass.

Ice cube tray

Ice cube trays are designed to be filled with water, then placed in a freezer until the water freezes to ice, producing ice cubes. Trays are often flexible, so the frozen cubes can be easily removed by flexing the tray. Twist ice trays have a simple spring loaded mechanism with a lever that is used to turn the tray upside down and flex at the same time such that the cubes drop are collected in a removable tray below and return the ice cube tray to its upright position without removing it from the freezer which can save time and reduces accidents and mess, though the tray has to be removed to be collected and the ice cube tray still has to be removed to be refilled. An alternative system is an aluminum tray with a lever that raises the ice cubes, freeing them from the tray. A motorized version of this is found in most automatic ice-making freezers.

While the usual shape of the ice 'cube' is roughly cubical, there are trays that dispense hemispherical or cylindrical blocks. These are commonly referred to as ice tubes. Some novelty trays produce blocks of ice in seasonal, festive or other shapes.

The first rubber ice cube tray was invented by Lloyd Groff Copeman. One day in 1928, while walking through some woods collecting sap for maple syrup, Copeman noticed that slush and ice flaked off his rubber boots rather than adhering to them. Having recalled this incident over lunch with his patent attorney, he conducted experiments using rubber cups. Later, he set about designing and then patenting different types of tray: a metal tray with rubber separators, a metal tray with individual rubber cups, and a tray made completely of rubber.

The first flexible stainless steel, all-metal ice cube tray was created by Guy L. Tinkham in 1933. The tray bent sideways to remove the ice cubes.

Several companies now offer pre-filled disposable ice trays for home freezing, which they claim provide better taste and reduced risk of contamination.

Large-scale ice cube production

Dedicated ice-maker machines can be used to produce ice cubes for laboratories and academic use. Ice cubes are also produced commercially and sold in bulk; these ice cubes, despite their name, are often cylindrical, and may have holes through the center.

An interesting characteristic of commercially made ice cubes is that they are completely clear, lacking the clouding found in the center of domestically made ice cubes. Cloudy ice cubes result when water is frozen quickly, or when the water is high in dissolved solids. When water is cooled to its freezing point, and ice starts to form, dissolved gases can no longer stay in solution and come out as microscopic bubbles. However, as ice floats in water, once there is enough ice to form a layer on the surface, the ice layer traps all bubbles within the ice cube. Commercial ice-makers use a flowing source of purified water to make ice with cooling elements at the bottom, allowing the bubbles to be washed away from the top as the cube grows.

See also

Ice pack

Pagophagia

Refrigeration

Ice

References

External links

Hot water can freeze faster than cold water

Category:Water ice Category:Bartending equipment

ca:Glaçó da:Isterning de:Eiswürfel es:Cubito de hielo fr:Glaçon he:קוביית קרח nl:IJsblokje ja:クラッシュドアイス no:Isbit oc:Glaçon ru:Кубики льда simple:Ice cube fi:Jääpala sv:Isbit zh:冰塊

Name	Paul Watson
Birth date	December 02, 1950
Birth place	Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Nationality	Canada
Occupation	activist, television personality
Spouse	Starlet LumLisa DiStefanoAllison Lance
Website	SeaShepherd.org
Footnotes	}}

Paul Watson (born December 2, 1950) is a Canadian animal rights and environmental activist, who founded and is president of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, a direct action group devoted to marine conservation.

The Toronto native joined a Sierra Club protest against nuclear testing in 1969. He was an early and influential member of Greenpeace, crewed and skippered for it, and later was a board member. Watson argued for a strategy of direct action that conflicted with the Greenpeace interpretation of nonviolence, was ousted from the board in 1977, and subsequently left the organization. That same year, he formed Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. The group is the subject of a reality show, ''Whale Wars''.

He also promotes veganism, voluntary human population control, and a biocentric, rather than anthropocentric, worldview.

Early and personal life

Paul Watson was born in Toronto to Anthony Joseph Watson and Annamarie Larsen, and grew up in St. Andrews, New Brunswick. After working as a tour guide at Expo 67, the World's Fair that took place in Montreal in 1967, Watson "rode the rails" in boxcars west to Vancouver.

In 1968 and the early 1970s, he joined the Canadian Coast Guard, where he served aboard weatherships, search and rescue hovercraft, and buoy tenders. He signed up as a merchant seaman in 1969 with the Norwegian Consulate in Vancouver and shipped out on the 35,000 ton bulk carrier ''Bris'' as a deck hand. The ''Bris'' was registered in Oslo, Norway and manifested for the Indian Ocean and Pacific trade.

Watson has one child (born 1980) with his first wife, Starlet Lum, who was a founding director of Greenpeace Quebec, Earthforce!, Project Wolf, and Sea Shepherd. His second wife, Lisa DiStefano, a former model, was Sea Shepherd's Director of Operations during the Makah anti-whaling campaigns in Friday Harbor. His third wife, Allison Lance, is an animal rights activist and a volunteer crew member of Sea Shepherd.

Activism

Early years

In October 1969, Watson joined a Sierra Club protest against nuclear testing at Amchitka Island. The group which formed as a result of that protest was the Don't Make a Wave Committee, which evolved into the group known today as Greenpeace. Watson sailed as a crewmember aboard the ''Greenpeace Too!'' ship in 1971 and skippered the Greenpeace boat ''Astral'' in 1972. Paul Watson continued as a crew member, skipper, and officer aboard several Greenpeace voyages throughout the mid-1970s. According to Watson, in June 1975 during a Greenpeace campaign to confront Soviet whaling, an incident occurred which changed his life.

Greenpeace states that Watson "...was an influential early member but not, as he sometimes claims, a founder." Paul Watson maintains he was indeed a founding member.

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

The first Sea Shepherd vessel, the ''Sea Shepherd'', was purchased in December 1978 with assistance from Fund for Animals. Sea Shepherd soon established itself as one of the more controversial environmental groups, known for provocative direct action tactics. These tactics have included throwing objects onto the decks of whaling ships, the use of "prop foulers" in an attempt to sabotage the ships, boarding whaling vessels, and the scuttling of two ships in an Icelandic harbor. Watson uses the title "captain", although he has never been licensed as a ship's captain. The organization and its activities to halt whaling are the focus of a reality TV series, ''Whale Wars'', airing on Animal Planet.

Other environmental activities

Watson was a field correspondent for Defenders of Wildlife from 1976 to 1980 and a field representative for the Fund for Animals from 1978 to 1981. Watson also was a co-founder of Friends of the Wolf and Earthforce Environmental Society.

During the 1980s, Watson declared his support for Earth First! and cultivated friendships with David Foreman and Edward Abbey. He proclaimed Sea Shepherd to be the "navy" of Earth First! Watson has claimed to have invented the tactic of tree spiking.

Although currently unaffiliated with it, Watson did work with the Green Party of British Columbia in Vancouver in the 1980s and 90s. He ran for mayor in 1996, placing fourth.

In April 2003, Watson was elected to the board of directors of the Sierra Club for a three-year term. In 2006, he did not seek re-election. He resigned from the board a month before his term ended, in protest against the organization's sponsorship of a "Why I Hunt" essay contest.

Watson feels that "no human community should be larger than 20,000 people," human populations need to be reduced radically to "fewer than one billion," and only those who are "completely dedicated to the responsibility" of caring for the biosphere should have children, which is a "very small percentage of humans." He likens humankind to a virus, the biosphere needs to get cured from with a "radical and invasive approach," as from cancer.

In January 2008 Paul Watson was named by ''The Guardian'' as one of its "50 people who could save the planet" for the work of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

Writings on activism

Watson published ''Earthforce!'', a guide to strategy for environmental activists in 1993. In it, he specifically endorsed the tactics of "monkeywrenching" previously described by Dave Foreman and Edward Abbey. According to Foreman in ''Eco-Defense—The Field Guide to Monkey-Wrenching'', these are tactics of sabotage, covert activity, and direct action. Watson says he incorporated his own personal experience in writing the book.

In ''Earthforce! An Earth Warrior’s Guide to Strategy'', Watson also expresses disdain for truthfulness in the pursuit of environmental protection goals:

The nature of the mass media today is such that the truth is irrelevant. What is true and what is right to the general public is what is defined as true and right by the mass media. Ronald Reagan understood that the facts are not relevant. The media reported what he said as fact. Follow-up investigation was “old news.” A headline comment on Monday’s newspaper far outweighs the revelation of inaccuracy revealed in a small box inside the paper on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Watson was explicit on this score: “If you do not know an answer, a fact, or a statistic, then simply follow the example of an American President and do as Ronald Reagan did—make it up on the spot and deliver the information confidently and without hesitation.” In a subsequent book, ''Ocean Warrior'', Watson reiterated this view, saying: “Survival in a media culture meant developing the skills to understand and manipulate media to achieve strategic objectives.”

Controversy

Removal from Greenpeace Board

Paul Watson continued as a crewmember, officer, and skipper (in 1972) aboard several Greenpeace voyages throughout the mid-1970s. He considers himself a founding member of Greenpeace and Greenpeace International, a claim Greenpeace disputes. Friends noted that his personality, his liking to "push himself front and centre", was to blame in addition to his espousing direct actions that Greenpeace did not agree with.

In 1977, Watson was expelled from the Greenpeace's board of directors by a vote of 11 to 1 (Watson himself cast the single vote against it). The group felt his strong, "front and center" personality and frequently voiced opposition to Greenpeace's interpretation of "nonviolence" were too divisive. Watson subsequently left the group. The group has since labeled his actions at the time as those of a "mutineer" within their ranks. That same year, he founded his own group, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

During an interview in 1978 with CBC Radio, Watson spoke out against Greenpeace (as well as other organizations) and their role and motives for the anti-sealing campaigns. Watson accused these organizations of campaigning against the Canadian seal hunt because it is an easy way to raise money and it is a profit maker for the organizations.

Greenpeace has called Watson a violent extremist and will no longer comment on his activities. Watson was arrested in 1993 in Canada on charges stemming from actions against Cuban and Spanish fishing boats off the coast of Newfoundland. In 1997, Watson was convicted ''in absentia'' and sentenced to serve 120 days in jail by a court in Lofoten, Norway on charges of attempting to sink the small scale Norwegian fishing and whaling vessel ''Nybrænna'' on 26 December 1992. Dutch authorities refused to hand him over to Norwegian authorities although he did spend 80 days in detention in the Netherlands pending a ruling on extradition before being released.

There have not been any successful attempts at prosecuting Watson for his activities with Sea Shepherd since the trial in Newfoundland. Watson himself defends his actions as falling within international law, in particular Sea Shepherd's right to enforce maritime regulations against illegal whalers and sealers. Watson caught a Costa Rican fishing boat poaching in Guatemalan waters while he was on a journey to Costa Rica, having been invited by its president to help in the fight against shark poaching there. The authorities in Costa Rica later filed a charge of attempted murder against Watson and a colleague, Rob Stewart, in what Watson and Stewart have described as an effort to cover up mafia-funded illegal shark finning operations. They eventually fled to international waters to escape arrest by Costa Rican coast guards after they had filmed what they attest was mafia-funded shark-finning in private docks. These events are featured in ''Sharkwater'', a documentary about sharks and activism.

Watson was also told to leave Iceland after disabling two ships in harbor and turning himself in to the Icelandic police . Kristjan Loftsson of Iceland's largest whaling company told ''The New Yorker'' that Watson is ''persona non grata'' in that country.

In April 2010, the Japanese Coast Guard obtained an arrest warrant for Watson "...on suspicion of ordering sabotage activities against Japan's whaling fleet", and Interpol has listed him as wanted at the request of Japan. The blue notice asks national police forces to provide information on Watson's whereabouts and activities, but does not seek an arrest.

Sierra Club immigration stance

After his election to the national Sierra Club Board of Directors in 2003, Watson supported an unsuccessful slate of candidates supporting strict immigration controls as an element of a population stabilization policy. This effort was denounced by another candidate in the election, Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center, as a "hostile takeover" attempt by "radical anti-immigrant activists." Watson responded by saying that the only change he was seeking in the organization's immigration stance was to restore the position it had held before its 1996 "neutrality policy." Watson left the Sierra Club board in 2006.

Anti-sealing activities

In April 2008, Watson stated that, while the deaths of three Canadian seal hunters (a fourth one is still missing) in a marine accident involving a Canadian Coast Guard vessel and a fishing boat during the 2008 Canadian Commercial Seal Hunt were a tragedy, he felt that the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of seals is an even greater tragedy. Canadian Federal Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn accused Watson of trivializing the memory of the lost sealers. Watson replied that Mr. Hearn was trying to distract attention from his government's incompetence as the boat the men were on capsized while under tow by a Canadian Coast Guard vessel, while his political ambitions continued to support and subsidize an industry that had no place in the 21st Century. Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams was quoted as saying, "I think what a lot of people don't realize is that this man is a terrorist." Due to the operations against Canadian seal hunters, Danny Williams called Watson a terrorist and said that the Sea Shepherds were not welcome in the province.

Australian visa issues

In October 2009 Watson, who carries a US passport, complained to media outlets about having his request for an Australian visa denied. He states that the Australian government was attempting to sabotage the upcoming 2010 Sea Shepherd campaign by denying him entry into the country. Watson and several other shipmates were also unable to join the MV Steve Irwin on its promotional tour of Australia until they were able to provide documentation from the governments of the United States, Canada and Norway, exonerating them from previously claimed acts of violence, specifically claims by Sea Shepherd of intentionally sinking a ship in Norway.

Anti-whaling activities and alleged shooting

On March 17, 2008 Paul Watson said that he was shot by the Japanese crew or coast guard personnel during the Operation Migaloo anti-whaling campaign in the Southern Ocean. The incident is documented during the season finale of season 1 of the ''Whale Wars'' TV reality show, and the first six episodes are covered as a buildup to what is portrayed as the major incident during the campaign. The footage in ''Whale Wars'' shows Watson standing on the deck of the ''Steve Irwin'' while Sea Shepherd crew throws glass bottles filled with butyric acid at the ''Nisshin Maru'' whaling vessel. Butyric acid was used for its foul odor and sticky properties. The Japanese respond by throwing flashbang devices. Watson is then shown reaching inside his jacket and body armour and remarking "I've been hit." Back inside the bridge of the Steve Irwin, a metal fragment is found inside the vest.

The Japanese Institute of Cetacean Research has dismissed Sea Shepherd's statements as lies. The Institute and Coast Guard said that they used seven flashbang devices designed to flash and make noise in the air without causing harm. Neither of the two conflicting accounts have been independently verified. The Australian Foreign Affairs Department had condemned "actions by crew members of any vessel that cause injury". Two media releases were made on the same day from the office. One said that the Australian Embassy in Tokyo had been informed by the Japanese that the whalers had "fired warning shots" while the updated version used the phrase "'warning balls' – also known as 'flashbangs' – had been fired".

Watson has been called an eco terrorist by the Japanese government for his direct action tactics against whalers, and have repeated their position after conflicts during the 2009-10 whaling season.

Leadership style

His leadership style has variously been called arrogant, as well as pushing himself too much "front and center", which was cited as being one of the reasons he and Greenpeace parted ways. The atmosphere aboard his vessels has been compared to an "anarchy run by God".

The former member of Sea Shepherd and captain of the ''Ady Gil'' Pete Bethune described Watson as “morally bankrupt” who would order the intentional sinking of his own ships like the Ady Gil as a means to “garner sympathy with the public and to create better TV”.

Attitudes about his activism

At an animal rights convention in 2002, Paul Watson was also quoted as saying, "There's nothing wrong with being a terrorist, as long as you win. Then you write the history." Recently, Fox News commentator Glenn Beck also discussed the comment, criticizing Watson's views. Watson responded to Beck's comments on the official Sea Shepherd website by stating that he had said that but that it was taken out of context, quoting Gerald Seymour's "One man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter.”

Watson has stated that he does not consider himself a 'protester', but an 'interventionist', as he considers protesting as too submissive. He often takes the attitude that he represents (or stands in for) law enforcement which is either unwilling or unable to enforce existing laws.

In popular culture

A biographical documentary on Paul Watson's early life and background entitled ''Pirate for the Sea'' was produced by Ron Colby in 2008. The 2009 documentary ''At the Edge of the World'' chronicled the efforts of Watson and 45 volunteers to hinder the Japanese whaling fleet in the waters around Antarctica.

Watson, ''Whale Wars'', and the Japanese whaling industry were satirized in the ''South Park'' episode "Whale Whores". Watson himself was called "An unorganized incompetent media whore who thought lying to everyone was OK as long as it served his cause" and "A smug, narcoleptic liar with no credibility". Watson responded to the ''South Park'' episode by stating; "My understanding is that the Japanese prime minister was not amused, and the whalers and dolphin killers are enraged at the way they were portrayed," Watson said. "That’s music to my ears. If the humorless whale killers and the bank-rollers of the dolphin killers did not like the show, then that’s all I need to applaud it."

Works

''Sea Shepherd: My Fight for Whales and Seals'' (1981) (ISBN 0-393-01499-1)

''Earthforce! An Earth Warrior's Guide to Strategy'' (1993) (ISBN 0-9616019-5-7)

''Ocean Warrior: My Battle to End the Illegal Slaughter on the High Seas'' (1994) (ISBN 1-55013-599-6)

''Seal Wars: Twenty-Five Years on the Front Lines With the Harp Seals'' (2002) (ISBN 1-55297-751-X)

Contributor to ''Terrorists or Freedom Fighters?: Reflections on the Liberations of Animals'' (2004) (ISBN 1-59056-054-X)

References

Further reading

''Earth Warrior: Overboard With Paul Watson and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society'', by David B. Morris (1995) (ISBN 1-55591-203-6)

''Eco-Warriors'', by Rik Scarce (2006) (ISBN 1-59874-028-8)

External links

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society official website

Category:1950 births Category:Canadian environmentalists Category:Canadian vegans Category:Green Party of British Columbia politicians Category:Sierra Club Category:Living people Category:Green thinkers Category:Sea Shepherd Conservation Society Category:Sustainability advocates Category:People from Charlotte County, New Brunswick Category:People from Toronto Category:Animal rights advocates Category:People associated with Greenpeace

de:Paul Watson es:Paul Watson fr:Paul Watson is:Paul Watson it:Paul Watson nl:Paul Watson ja:ポール・ワトソン no:Paul Watson pl:Paul Watson pt:Paul Watson ru:Уотсон, Пол fi:Paul Watson sv:Paul Watson tr:Paul Watson

Name	Nigel Farage
Honorific-suffix	MEP
Office	Europe of Freedom and Democracy President
Term start	1 July 2009 (de facto)
Predecessor	(post established)
Office	Leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party
Term start	5 November 2010
Predecessor	Jeffrey Titford
Term start1	27 September 2006
Term end1	27 November 2009
Predecessor1	Roger Knapman
Successor1	Lord Pearson of Rannoch
Office2	Member of the European Parliament for South East England
Term start2	15 July 1999
Birth date	April 03, 1964
Birth place	Kent, England, United Kingdom
Nationality	British
Party	UK Independence Party
Spouse	Gráinne Hayes (1988-1997, divorced)Kirsten Mehr (1999-present)
Children	4
Alma mater	Dulwich College
Religion	Church of England
Website	Nigel Farage MEP
Footnotes	}}

Nigel Paul Farage (, ; born 3 April 1964, Farnborough,Kent), is a British politician and is the Leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), a position he also held from September 2006 to November 2009. He is a Member of the European Parliament for South East England and co-chairs the Eurosceptic Europe of Freedom and Democracy group.

Farage is a founding member of the UKIP, having left the Conservative Party in 1992 after they signed the Maastricht Treaty. Having unsuccessfully campaigned in European and Westminster parliamentary elections for UKIP since 1994, he gained a seat as an MEP for South East England in the 1999 European Parliament Election — the first year the regional list system was used — and was re-elected in 2004 and 2009. Farage describes himself as a libertarian and rejects the notion that he is a conservative.

In September 2006, Farage became the UKIP Leader and led the party through the 2009 European Parliament Election in which it received the second highest share of the popular vote, defeating Labour and the Liberal Democrats with over two million votes. However he stepped down in November 2009 to concentrate on contesting the Speaker John Bercow's seat of Buckingham in the 2010 general election.

At the 2010 General Election, Farage failed to unseat John Bercow and received only the third highest share of the vote in the constituency. Shortly after the polls opened on 6 May 2010, Nigel Farage was injured in an aircraft crash in Northamptonshire. The two-seated PZL-104 Wilga 35A had been towing a pro-UKIP banner when it flipped over and crashed shortly after takeoff. Both Farage and the pilot were hospitalised with non-life-threatening injuries.

In November 2010, Farage successfully stood in the 2010 UKIP leadership contest, following the resignation of its leader, Lord Pearson of Rannoch. Farage was also ranked 41st (out of 100) in ''The Daily Telegraph'''s Top 100 most influential right-wingers poll in October 2009, citing his media savvy and his success with UKIP in the European Elections. Farage was ranked 58th in the 2010 list compiled by Iain Dale and Brian Brivati for the Daily Telegraph.

Background

Farage was educated at Dulwich College before joining a commodity brokerage firm in London. He ran his own brokerage business from the early 1990s until 2002. In his early 20s Farage was diagnosed with testicular cancer but made a full recovery.

Farage has been married twice. He married Gráinne Hayes in 1988, with whom he had two children: Samuel (1989) and Thomas (1991). In 1999 he married Kirsten Mehr, a German national, by whom he has two more children, Victoria (born 2000) and Isabelle (born 2005).

Farage has also penned his own memoirs, entitled "Fighting Bull." It outlines the founding of UKIP and his personal and political life so far.

Political career

Conservative Party

Active in the Conservative Party from his school days, Farage left the party in 1992 when John Major's government signed the Treaty on European Union at Maastricht.

UKIP and the European Parliament

Farage became a founding member of UKIP in 1993.

He was elected to the European Parliament in 1999 and re-elected in 2004 and 2009. Farage is presently the leader of the thirteen-member UKIP contingent in the European Parliament, and co-leader of the multinational eurosceptic group, Europe of Freedom and Democracy.

UKIP party leadership

On 12 September 2006, Farage was elected leader of UKIP with 45% of the vote, 20% ahead of his nearest rival. He pledged to bring discipline to the party and to maximise UKIP's representation in local, parliamentary and other elections. In a PM programme interview on BBC Radio 4 that day he pledged to end the public perception of UKIP as a single-issue party and to work with allied politicians in the Better Off Out campaign, committing himself not to stand against the MPs who have signed up to that campaign (ten in all at this moment).

At his maiden speech to the UKIP conference on 8 October 2006, he told delegates that the party was "at the centre-ground of British public opinion" and the "real voice of opposition". Farage said: "We've got three social democratic parties in Britain — Labour, Lib Dem and Conservative are virtually indistinguishable from each other on nearly all the main issues" and "you can't put a cigarette paper between them and that is why there are nine million people who don't vote now in general elections that did back in 1992."

At 10pm on 19 October 2006, Farage took part in a three-hour live interview and phone-in with James Whale on national radio station talkSPORT. Four days later, Whale announced on his show his intention to stand as UKIP's candidate in the 2008 London Mayoral Election. Farage said that Whale "not only has guts, but an understanding of what real people think". However Whale later decided not to stand and UKIP was represented by Gerard Batten. He stood again for UKIP leadership in 2010 after his successor Lord Pearson stood down. On the 5th November 2010 it was announced Farage had won the leadership contest.

Westminster elections

Farage had unsuccessfully contested UK parliamentary elections for UKIP five times, both before and after his election as an MEP in 1999. Under the 2002 European Union decision to forbid MEPs from holding a dual mandate, if he was ever elected to the House of Commons, he would have to resign his seat as an MEP.

When he contested the Bromley & Chislehurst constituency in a May 2006 by-election, organised after the sitting MP representing it, eurosceptic Conservative Eric Forth, died, Farage came third, winning 8% of the vote, beating the Labour Party candidate. This was the second-best by-election result recorded by UKIP out of 25 results, and the first time since the Liverpool Walton by-election in 1991 that a party in government had been pushed into fourth place in a parliamentary by-election on mainland Britain.

2010 UK General election

On 4 September 2009 Farage resigned as leader of UKIP to concentrate on his campaign to become Member of Parliament for Buckingham at Westminster in the 2010 general election. He later told Times journalist Camilla Long that UKIP internal fights took up too much time.

He stood against Buckingham MP John Bercow, the newly elected Speaker of the House of Commons, despite a convention that the speaker, as a political neutral, is not normally challenged in his or her bid for re-election by any of the major parties.

On 6 May, on the morning the polls opened in the election, just before eight o'clock Farage was involved in a light aircraft crash, suffering injuries described as non-life-threatening. A spokesperson told the BBC that "it was unlikely Mr Farage would be discharged from hospital today [6 May] Although his injuries were originally described as minor, his sternum and ribs were broken, and his lung punctured. The Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) report said that the aeroplane was towing a banner, which caught in the tailplane, forcing the nose down.

Farage came third with 8,401 votes. Bercow was re-elected, and in second place with 10,331 votes was John Stevens, a former Conservative MEP who campaigned as an independent accompanied by "Flipper the Dolphin" (a reference to MPs flipping second homes).

On 1 December 2010, the pilot of the aircraft involved in the accident was charged with threatening to kill Farage. He was also charged with threatening to kill an AAIB official involved in the investigation into the accident. In April 2011, Justin Adams was found guilty of making death threats. The judge said the defendant was "clearly extremely disturbed" at the time the offences happened adding "He is a man who does need help. If I can find a way of giving him help I will."

Alternative Vote referendum, May 2011

Farage declared himself personally in favour of the Alternative Vote system of May 2011, saying first-past-the-post is a "nightmare" for UKIP. However, the party's stance has to be decided by its central policy making committee.

Controversies and whistleblowing

Copyright infringement

In 1999 the BBC spent four months filming a documentary about his European elections campaign but didn't show it. Farage, then head of UKIP's South East office, asked for a video and got friends to make illegal copies which were sold for £5 through the UKIP magazine. Surrey Trading Standards investigated and Farage has admitted the offence.

Expenses disclosure

In May 2009, ''The Guardian'' reported that Farage had said in a speech to the Foreign Press Association that over ten years as a member of the European Parliament he received £2 million of taxpayers' money in staff, travel, and other expenses on top of his £64,000 a year salary.

The former Europe Minister, Denis MacShane, said that this showed that Farage was "happy to line his pockets with gold". Farage called this a "misrepresentation", pointing out that the money had been used to promote UKIP's message, not salary, but he welcomed the focus on the issue of MEP expenses, claiming that "[o]ver a five year term each and every one of Britain's 78 MEPs gets about £1 million. It is used to employ administrative staff, run their offices and to travel back and forth between their home, Brussels and Strasbourg." He also pointed out the money spent on the YES campaign in Ireland by the European Commission was "something around 440 million", making the NO campaign's figure insignificant in comparison.

Jacques Barrot

On 18 November 2004, Farage announced in the European Parliament that Jacques Barrot, the French Commissioner designate, had been barred from elected office in France for 2 years, after being convicted in 2000 of embezzling £2 million from government funds and diverting it into the coffers of his party. He claimed that French President Jacques Chirac had granted Barrot amnesty. Although initial BBC reports claimed that, under French law, it was illegal even to mention the conviction, the prohibition in question only applies to French officials in the course of their duties. The president of the Parliament, Josep Borrell, enjoined him to retract his comments under threat of "legal consequences". However, the following day it was confirmed that Barrot had received an 8 month suspended jail sentence in the case, and that this had been quickly expunged by the amnesty decided by Chirac and his parliamentary majority. The Commission's president, Jose Manuel Barroso admitted that he had not known of Barrot's criminal record when appointing him as a Commission vice-president. The Socialist and Liberal groups in the European Parliament then joined UKIP in demanding the resignation of Barrot for failing to disclose the conviction during his confirmation hearings.

José Manuel Barroso

During the spring of 2005, Farage requested that the European Commission disclose where the individual Commissioners had spent their holidays. The Commission did not provide the information requested, on the basis that the Commissioners had a right of privacy. The German newspaper ''Die Welt'' reported that the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso had spent a week on the yacht of the Greek shipping billionaire Spiro Latsis. It emerged soon afterwards that this had occurred a month before the Commission under Barroso's predecessor Romano Prodi approved 10.3 million euro of Greek state aid for Latsis' shipping company. It also became known that Peter Mandelson, then a member of the Commission, had accepted a trip to Jamaica from an unrevealed source.

Farage persuaded around 75 MEPs from across the political divide to back a motion of no confidence in Barroso, which would be sufficient to compel Barroso to appear before the European Parliament to be questioned on the issue. The motion was successfully tabled on 12 May 2005, and Barroso appeared before Parliament at a debate on 26 May 2005. The motion was heavily defeated. A Conservative MEP, Roger Helmer, was expelled from his group, the European People's Party - European Democrats (EPP-ED) in the middle of the debate by that group's leader Hans-Gert Poettering as a result of his support for Farage's motion.

Joseph Daul

In January 2007, the French farmers' leader Joseph Daul was elected the new leader of the European People's Party–European Democrats (EPP-ED), the European Parliamentary grouping which then included the British Conservatives. The UK Independence Party almost immediately revealed that Daul had been under judicial investigation in France since 2004 as part of an inquiry into the alleged misuse of public funds worth €16 million (£10.6 million) by French farming unions." It was not suggested that Daul had personally benefited, but was accused of "complicity and concealment of the abuse of public funds." Daul accused Farage of publicising the investigation for political reasons and threatened to sue Farage, but did not do so though the court dropped all charges against him.

Prince Charles

Prince Charles gave a speech to the European Parliament on 14 February 2008, in which he called for EU leadership in the war against climate change. During the standing ovation that followed, Farage was the only MEP to remain seated and went on to describe the Prince's advisers as "naïve and foolish at best." Farage continued: "How can somebody like Prince Charles be allowed to come to the European Parliament at this time to announce he thinks it should have more powers? It would have been better for the country he wants to rule one day if he had stayed home and tried to persuade Gordon Brown to give the people the promised referendum [on the Treaty of Lisbon]." The leader of the UK Labour Party's MEPs, Gary Titley, accused Farage of anti-Royalism. Titley said: "I was embarrassed and disgusted when the Leader of the UK Independence Party, Nigel Farage, remained firmly seated during the lengthy standing ovation Prince Charles received. I had not realised Mr Farage's blind adherence to right wing politics involved disloyalty and discourtesy to the Royal Family. He should be thoroughly ashamed of himself and should apologise to the British people he represents."

Herman Van Rompuy

After the speech of Herman Van Rompuy on 24 February 2010 in the European parliament, Farage—to protests from other MEPs—addressed the first long-term President of the European Council saying that he has the "charisma of a damp rag and the appearance of low grade bank clerk". Farage questioned the legitimacy of Van Rompuy's appointment asking "Who are you? I'd never heard of you, nobody in Europe had ever heard of you", he also asserted that Van Rompuy's "intention is to be the quiet assassin of European democracy and of European nation states." In the same speech he also referred to Belgium, the home of Van Rompuy, as a "non-country". Van Rompuy commented afterwards, "There was one contribution that I can only hold in contempt, but I'm not going to comment further." After refusing to apologise for behaviour that was, in the words of the President of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, "inappropriate, unparliamentary and insulting to the dignity of the House", Farage was reprimanded and had his right to ten days' allowance (expenses) rescinded.

The President of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, said after his meeting with Farage:

I defend absolutely Mr Farage's right to disagree about the policy or institutions of the Union, but not to personally insult our guests in the European Parliament or the country from which they may come. [. . .] I myself fought for free speech as the absolute cornerstone of a democratic society. But with freedom comes responsibility - in this case, to respect the dignity of others and of our institutions. I am disappointed by Mr Farage's behaviour, which sits ill with the great parliamentary tradition of his own country. I cannot accept this sort of behaviour in the European Parliament. I invited him to apologise, but he declined to do so. I have therefore - as an expression of the seriousness of the matter - rescinded his right to ten days' daily allowance as a Member.

Questioned by Camilla Long, Farage declared of his speech "it wasn't abusive, it was right."

European economic governance

He spoke of the EU being "German-dominated" in a speech at the European-Parliament on 18 November 2011.

Views on the euro

From taking office as a UKIP MEP in 1999, Farage has often voiced opposition to the "euro project". His argument is that "a one size fits all interest rate" cannot work for countries with structurally different economies, often using the example of Greece and Germany to emphasise contrast. He predicted the need for 'bailouts' before European Commission and European Central Bank officials admitted that these steps would be necessary. Specifically, Farage predicted that Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain would all require such assistance. To date, Spain is the only predicted country that has not asked for a 'bailout'. Although Spain and Italy have both had indirect assistance from the ECB, whereby secondary government bonds are bought by the central bank, they are prohibited from purchasing new bonds. Farage warns: "You can ignore the markets if you want to, but in time the markets will not ignore you". Farage also reinforces Germany's argument that Italy "should never have joined the euro".

Farage predicts that if the situation continues it will lead to violence due to the people's inability to "determine their own futures through the ballot box" as it will become the only "logical" tool to enable them to escape from their "economic prison" i.e. the Eurozone. He proclaims "I can only hope and pray that the euro project is destroyed by the markets before that really happens."

Farage strongly opposes the use of 'bailouts' and claims that "buying your own debt with tax payers money" will not solve the problem and that, "if we do, the next debt crisis won't be a country", "it will be the European Central Bank itself".

Electoral performance

Nigel Farage has contested several elections under the United Kingdom Independence Party banner:

Itchen, Test and Avon, European Parliament Election 1994 - 12,423 votes, representing 5.2% of total votes cast

Eastleigh by-election, 1994 - 952, 1.4%

Salisbury, 1997 general election - 3,332, 5.7%

European Parliament election, 1999 - elected member for South East England from party list

Bexhill and Battle, 2001 general election - 3,474, 7.8%

European Parliament election, 2004 - elected member for South East England from party list

South Thanet, 2005 general election - 2,079, 5.0%

Bromley and Chislehurst by-election, 2006 - 2,307, 8.0%

European Parliament election, 2009 - elected member for South East England from party list.

Buckingham, 2010 general election - 8,410, 17.4%

Footnotes

References

2002 Amnesty law

Penal Code, articles L133-9, L133-10, L133-11

External links

Nigel Farage MEP ''Official website''

Nigel Farage ''Profile at European Parliament website''

UKIP MEPs ''Official website of the UK Independence Party in the European Parliament''

Europe of Freedom and Democracy ''Political group in the European Parliament''

Category:1964 births Category:Living people Category:United Kingdom Independence Party politicians Category:Members of the European Parliament for English constituencies Category:Critics of the European Union Category:People from Farnborough, London Category:People educated at Dulwich College Category:Leaders of the United Kingdom Independence Party Category:British libertarians Category:UK Independence Party MEPs Category:MEPs for the United Kingdom 1999–2004 Category:MEPs for the United Kingdom 2004–2009 Category:MEPs for the United Kingdom 2009–2014 Category:Survivors of aviation accidents or incidents Category:Testicular cancer survivors

br:Nigel Farage cs:Nigel Farage cy:Nigel Farage de:Nigel Farage et:Nigel Farage el:Νάιτζελ Φάρατζ es:Nigel Farage eo:Nigel Farage fr:Nigel Farage it:Nigel Farage nl:Nigel Farage no:Nigel Farage pl:Nigel Farage ro:Nigel Farage simple:Nigel Farage fi:Nigel Farage sv:Nigel Farage

name	Kim Dotcom
birth name	Kim Schmitz
birth date	January 21, 1974
birth place	Kiel, Germany
residence	New Zealand, Hong Kong
nationality	German
other names	Kimble, Kim Tim Jim Vestor
citizenship	German, Finnish
education	secondary modern school / junior high school
occupation	CIOCEO (2005–2011)
years active	2005–2012
organization	Megaupload Ltd.
known for	Founder of Megaupload.com and sister websites
home town	Kiel, Germany
height
weight
criminal charge	Computer fraud; insider trading; embezzlement; possession of stolen goods; abuse of titles
criminal penalty	Multiple suspended detentions
criminal status	Convicted, probation served
spouse	Mona
children	5}}

Kim Dotcom, born Kim Schmitz on January 21, 1974, also known as Kimble and Kim Tim Jim Vestor, is a German-Finnish businessman who rose to prominence during the dot-com bubble and was convicted of insider trading and embezzlement in its aftermath. He is also known as the founder of Megaupload and its associated websites. He legally changed his surname to Dotcom circa 2005. On January 20, 2012, the New Zealand Police placed him in custody under the charges of criminal copyright infringement in relation to his Megaupload Web site.

Early career

As a teenager, Dotcom became known in his native Germany for claims to have cracked corporate PBX systems in the United States, and tried to parlay it into a career in data security. That effort led to his arrest on charges of using and selling stolen calling card numbers. In 1994, Dotcom founded a computer security company called DataProtect. In 1999, DataProtect and IVM engineering presented the "Megacar", a Brabus-tuned Mercedes-Benz S-Class W220 which, among other features, had a Windows NT server, a 17.3" SGI flat panel display and combined 16 GSM modules to provide mobile broadband Internet access.

In 1998, Dotcom was convicted of computer fraud and handling stolen goods, and sentenced to two years of prison on probation. According to a report by ''News & Record'', he had traded stolen calling card numbers he bought from hackers in the United States. He achieved early notoriety by being the subject of an advanced-for-its-time flash animation video called Kimble Special Agent. The name is a reference to Richard Kimble, the main character of the television series ''The Fugitive''.

Dotcom later sold 80% of the shares of DataProtect to TÜV Rheinland in 2000, during the dot-com bubble. The former went bankrupt at the time of the subsequent market crash in 2001.

He is known for his large frame, as he is tall and weighs more than .

Insider trading and embezzlement

In 2001, Dotcom purchased €375,000 worth of shares of the nearly bankrupt company LetsBuyIt.com and subsequently announced his intention to invest €50 million in the company. Unknown to others, Dotcom did not have the funds available to invest, although the announcement caused the share value of LetsBuyIt.com to jump by nearly 300%. Dotcom sold his shares a few days later for €1.568 million.

Dotcom had also arranged and obtained an unsecured loan of €280,000 from Monkey AG, a company for which Dotcom had served as Chairman of the Board. The funds were to be paid to Kimvestor AG. As a result, both Monkey and Kimvestor went bankrupt. Dotcom expressed remorse, stating that he had been "dazzled" and had not recognized that he would be unable to repay the loans.

In January 2002, Dotcom was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand, deported to Germany, and subsequently sentenced to a probationary sentence of one year and eight months, and a €100,000 fine, the largest insider-trading case in Germany at the time. Dotcom also pleaded guilty to embezzlement in November 2003 and received a two-year probation sentence.

Megaupload and related companies

Megaupload Limited businesses

On 21 March 2005, Dotcom founded Megaupload Limited, a Hong Kong-based file hosting and sharing business that eventually became the 13th most popular site on the internet with over 150 employees, US$175 million revenues, 50 million visitors daily, and estimated to be responsible at its peak for 4% of all internet traffic.

The Megaupload business' domain names were seized and the sites shut down by the U.S. Justice Department on 19 January 2012, following their indictment and arrests of the owners for allegedly operating as an organization dedicated to copyright infringement.

Civil litigation and controversies

He was sued for copyright infringement as owner of Megaupload. A settlement was later filed.

In December 2011, Dotcom's Megaworld (owner of Megaupload, Megavideo, Megalive and more) released its "Megaupload Song" promotional music video, which featured Kanye West, will.i.am, Jamie Foxx, Sean "Diddy" Combs, Alicia Keys, Chris Brown and more lauding the service. Universal Music Group (UMG) responded by using the DMCA takedown process to have the clip removed from YouTube and other sites. Dotcom accused UMG of sending "illegitimate takedown notices", since UMG did not own the song in question, and Megaupload went on to file a lawsuit against UMG. A statement released by UMG claimed that a special arrangement exists between UMG and YouTube which allows UMG to take down any videos featuring their artists, regardless of copyright status. This claim was later explicitly denied by YouTube, which has since reinstated the video.

2012 arrest in New Zealand and seizure of Megaupload's websites

On January 5, 2012, indictments were filed in the United States against Dotcom on criminal copyright infringement charges along with Július Benčko and 5 other associates. On January 20, 2012, Kim Dotcom, Finn Batato, Mathias Ortmann and Bram van der Kolk were arrested in Coatesville, Auckland, New Zealand, by New Zealand Police, following an armed raid on Dotcom's house. New Zealand authorities were cooperating with the United States' FBI and Justice Department, Hong Kong Customs and the Hong Kong Department of Justice, the Netherlands Police Agency and the Public Prosecutor's Office for Serious Fraud and Environmental Crime in Rotterdam, London's Metropolitan Police Service, Germany’s Bundeskriminalamt and the German Public Prosecutors, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Department of Justice in the investigation preceding the arrests.

According to Dotcom's defense, the police operation against Megaupload was unnecessarily grandiose: "... armed officers arrived in helicopters and dropped into the Dotcom mansion courtyard."

On January 25, 2012 (NZ local time) Dotcom was initially refused bail due to alleged risks of fleeing to Germany, but was granted bail on February 22.

On February 6, Dotcom invited New Zealand journalist John Campbell of Campbell Live to visit his Coatesville property and inspect the damage done by police. According to head of security, Wayne Tempero "... the force was incredible ... Had they simply asked us we would have opened the door to any room they wanted to enter." He said Mr. Dotcom seemed shocked by the police action. "I remember him saying "copyright infringement" and shook his head, like he's going "what the hell?". We weren't building bombs in the cellar, we didn't have a meth lab bigger than the South Island here. This was a normal family house.".

On February 22, Kim Dotcom was released on bail under the condition that he remain within 80 km of his Coatesville residence and is barred from Internet access. Bail was granted after considering his flight risk and seizure of assets. Judge Dawson stated Dotcom has “every reason to stay to be with his family and fight to keep his assets.” The condition of bail came with a successful additional measure brought by the US Government to prevent Kim Dotcom's access to the Internet. Despite concerns about the interaction between Kim Dotcom and his legal team, Judge Dawson sided with the US government because Kim Dotcom "(has) the ability to use it for wrong purposes."

On March 1, Kim Dotcom gave his first interview to New Zealand media after his arrest to John Campbell of Campbell Live. He explained the close ties of his case to that of Viacom vs. YouTube; in which the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) shielded YouTube from the infringement of its users and described his surprise when he was arrested without trial or a hearing. Kim Dotcom also provided some of the aspects of his defense. Dotcom explains that the Megaupload was responsible for 800 files being transferred every second and that it would be impossible to police all that traffic. In addition, the US has privacy laws, such as Electronic Communication Privacy Act, which prohibits the administrators from looking into the accounts of the users.

On March 4, he released his diary detailing his first week since being out of prison and expressed his concerns that wife, Mona Dotcom, may be targeted by the US Authorities.

Other activities

Dotcom has taken part in the Gumball 3000 international road rally on several occasions, winning in 2001 in his Mercedes Brabus SV12 Megacar. He also competed in 2004. In a 2004 interview on Belgian Television, he claimed that in Morocco a car was blocking him and "he had to bump him off the road. Nothing happened to him". He claims he subsequently found out it was the Chief of Police in a "civil" car.

Before his arrest, Dotcom was the world's number one-ranked ''Modern Warfare 3'' player. The game has more than 15 million online players. On January 23, 2012 he lost the position and dropped to number two.

Since 2001, Dotcom has received media coverage as a founder of a Hong Kong based investing company called Trendax. The company claimed to use artificial intelligence to maximize investment return and Dotcom tried to find investors for a hedge fund managed by the company. According to media reports Dotcom never had a proper license to start the fund, though no fraud was suspected.

In 2010, Dotcom leased a NZ$30M mansion at Coatesville, near Auckland, owned by Richard and Ruth Bradley, the British founders of Chrisco, and considered the most expensive house in the country. He had an arrangement to buy the mansion when the lease expired, but the New Zealand Government declined his application to buy the land on the basis that he did not meet the "good character" test. Dotcom was granted permanent residency in New Zealand in 2010.

An investigative piece found Dotcom in Hong Kong business records with the new name "Kim Tim Jim Vestor", allegedly bearing a Finnish passport, and acting as director of several "Mega-" companies, among them Megaupload Ltd. and Megarotic Ltd. According to Megaupload spokesperson B. Lam, Kim is one of many shareholders at Mega and not involved in most day-to-day business decisions.

Kim Dotcom has spoken out against his negative portrayal in the media, claiming to be a reformed character and a legitimate businessman who has been unfairly demonized by United States authorities and industry trade groups such as the RIAA and MPAA. He contends that the services offered by his Megaupload site were not significantly different from those of comparable services such as Rapidshare or YouTube, and he has just been used as a scapegoat because of his hacker past. Dotcom is also keen to point out his charitable works, including funding the fireworks display for New Year 2011 in Auckland, and donating large amounts of money to the relief fund following the devastating 2011 Christchurch earthquakes, and explains that his property purchases in New Zealand were approved by several other government Ministers before being vetoed at the last minute by Justice Minister Simon Power, after the United States Department of Justice secretly asked his department for help with their investigation of Dotcom.

References

External links

The Register: Bin Laden hack-meister in defacement, financial debacles

The Register: YIHAT founder Kimble/Schmitz arrested

The Register: Kimble arrested for insider trading

The Register: Hoaxster hacker discovers infinite-wealth algorithm

Inside Megaupload's Megamind: Kim Dotcom's Playboy Bunnies, Russian Nuclear

3 News: Following the latest on Kim Dotcom / Schmitz

TV3 On Demand: Kim Dotcom / Schmitz first exclusive TV interview after his arrest in New Zealand

Category:German fraudsters Category:1974 births Category:Living people Category:German computer criminals Category:People deported from Thailand Category:German emigrants to New Zealand

de:Kim Schmitz es:Kim Dotcom fr:Kim Dotcom it:Kim Schmitz no:Kim Dotcom pt:Kim Dotcom ru:Шмиц, Ким sr:Kim Dotkom fi:Kim Dotcom zh:金·達康