Canadian tobacco companies Imperial Tobacco Canada and Rothmans were fined 1 billion Canadian dollars ($980 Million) for their role in smuggling cigarettes.

From Reuters:

The charges relate to the years between 1989 and 1994, when tobacco taxes, especially in Eastern Canadian provinces were so high that they prompted widespread cigarette smuggling. The taxes were intended to reduce smoking.

Cigarettes exported from Canada to the United States were then illegally brought back into the country, sometimes using native Indian reserves along the border.

A report released by the United States General Accountability Office (GAO) states that it found 42 confirmed cases of abuse committed by Foreign diplomats who were protected by diplomatic immunity.

From the Results in Brief:

We identified 42 distinct A-3 and G-5 visa holders who alleged that they were abused by foreign diplomats with some level of immunity from 2000 through 2008, but the total number of alleged incidents is likely higher. The 42 alleged incidents we confirmed include those identified by federal agencies, NGOs, and legal sources, such as Westlaw. Ten of these alleged incidents resulted in federal human trafficking investigations, most of which remain open. In one instance, Justice determined through its investigation that, absent immunity, it would indict the foreign diplomat’s wife. However, the diplomat’s home government declined to waive the wife’s immunity; thus, Justice could not indict. The diplomat and his wife subsequently left the United States. The total number of alleged incidents of household worker abuse by foreign diplomats with some level of immunity is likely higher than the 42 distinct alleged incidents we have identified for four reasons: household workers’ fear of contacting law enforcement authorities, NGOs’ need to maintain client confidentiality, limited information on some allegations handled by the U.S. government, and federal agencies’ difficulties in tracking household worker abuse allegations and investigations involving foreign diplomats. For example, the Foreign Affairs Manual 6 states that several offices and bureaus within State will provide the Office of Protocol and the Office of the Legal Adviser with reports on all cases that come to their attention, but we found that these offices were not aware of all cases that had been handled by the department. In addition, law enforcement agencies were unable to search their case management databases for investigations involving foreign diplomats because these databases are not designed to track investigations in this manner.

Read the entire report from the GAO here.

In recent weeks, the drug cartels in Mexico are increasingly killing innocent bystanders in the ongoing battle against each other and state officials.

From the Washington Post:

In the past, cartels have killed their rivals, as well as police and public officials. Occasionally even family members have been slain. Yet in recent weeks, an increasing number of innocent bystanders have been gunned down by suspected drug cartel hit men here in Sinaloa, a cartel stronghold on Mexico’s Pacific coast, as well as in the brutally contested drug corridors along the U.S. border.

In most instances, investigators believe, the victims were merely at the wrong place at the wrong time, gunned down by assassins who were once known for their precision but have now taken to wildly spraying bullets. The effect of the carnage has been widespread terror and a society afraid to demand justice.

“They have us in a panic,” Luciana Arredondo Arredondo, a prosecutor in Guamuchil, said of the cartels in an interview. “They have us terrorized.”

In a critical assessment of the Bush Administration’s strategy on terrorism, the Rand Corp. argues in a new study that attacking Al Qaeda militarily is ineffective and would be better of by concentrating on law enforcement agencies.

From the Washington Post:

The Bush administration’s terrorism-fighting strategy has not significantly undermined al-Qaeda’s capabilities, according to a major new study that argues the struggle against terrorism is better waged by law enforcement agencies than by armies.

The study by the nonpartisan Rand Corp. also contends that the administration committed a fundamental error in portraying the conflict with al-Qaeda as a “war on terrorism.” The phrase falsely suggests that there can be a battlefield solution to terrorism, and symbolically conveys warrior status on terrorists, it said.

“Terrorists should be perceived and described as criminals, not holy warriors,” authors Seth Jones and Martin Libicki write in “How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering al-Qaeda,” a 200-page volume released yesterday.

But the authors contend that al-Qaeda has sabotaged itself by creating ever greater numbers of enemies while not broadening its base of support. “Al-Qaeda’s probability of success in actually overthrowing any government is close to zero,” the report states.

Read the entire study in PDF form here.

Price of ivory has increased from $200 a kilo in 2004 to $850 to $900 in 2008.

Source: The Economist, “Call of the wild,” March 8, 2008, pg. 85.

In the early 1970s, the global rhino population stood at 75,000. In 2008, it stood around 11,000.

Source: The Economist, “Call of the wild”, March 8, 2008, pg. 86.

Source: The Economist, “Marching as to war,” February 2, 2008.

Source: The Economist, “Marching as to war,” February 2, 2008, pg. 45.

According to Foreign Policy Magazine, in the United States “roughly 40 percent of the country’s 1.8 million annual drug arrests are for cannabis possession.”

Source: Ethan Nadelmann, “Think Again: Drugs,” Foreign Policy, Sept/Oct 2007.

Source: Lenie Lectura, Losses from cable-TV piracy may hit P7B in ’08 with only 2% growth in paying subscribers, Business Mirror.