Bridging the gap between rich and poor in Israel

An Israeli organization is using the tricks and tools that have led to success for Israeli start-ups, to narrow the gap between the country's haves and have-nots.

(By David Halevi)

There's a distressingly widening gap in Israel - between the haves and have-nots, between the folks at the top of the economic ladder and those further down. It's an unhealthy situation, asserts Daphna Murvitz, director of Israel Ventures Network (IVN) - a unique organization that aims to bridge the gap between the "two Israels" by employing strategies that have transformed the country into a high-tech tiger in the social action sphere.

Building strength by investing in entrepreneurship through hands-on venture philanthropy is what the IVN is all about. Entrepreneurs from some of Israel's most successful companies - including Benny Levin, founder of NICE Systems, Ofer Shainberg of Concord Ventures, Ofer Timor of Delta Ventures, and Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat - are now, or have been, mentors for companies that received assistance from IVN.

"IVN was started by some of the most important entrepreneurs in Israel in order to bring management knowhow to organizations that seek to have an impact on society," Murvitz explains.

And many of these organizations were started by and for groups and populations that are definitely not in the upper echelons of society, relates Murvitz, clarifying that "this is not about the successful entrepreneurs 'going down to the people' to share their wisdom… - no one is on a pedestal. They take as much from the communities as they give." In that way, says Murvitz, minds meet, making Israeli society stronger.


Teaching sustainability

"We work in several ways to assist social service organizations to bring their visions from concept to reality," explains Murvitz. "Volunteers from the high-tech and business world bring their business and entrepreneurial skills to organizations, teaching them how to build self-sustaining organizations that can survive in the long-term - especially important now, with donations harder to come by as a result of the recession."

This current model is a change from the way IVN operated just a few years ago, when it was more involved in raising money for organizations and helping them to get off the ground. Instead, IVN now teaches their clients how to finance themselves, using innovative methods to raise money that can be self-sustaining, as opposed to giving them a one-time donation.

Regardless of the funding model, IVN has very specific criteria for the kinds of organizations it works with. Murvitz says: "We want ideas and projects that can eventually be adapted to work on a larger scale or that can be duplicated by others." For example, a jobs program that was started in the north after the 2006 Lebanon war by a private group, organized with help from IVN, developed a model that was so successful it was eventually taken over by regional government - and a similar program was instituted later in the Negev in the south.

"Programs like that, which can be replicated and expanded on a large scale - often by government - are the kind of programs IVN is looking for," Murvitz declares. In all cases, IVN seeks organizations that will have an impact on the community - creating jobs, and otherwise helping to foster an atmosphere of economic growth.


From high-tech to prayer shawls
Indeed, IVN has helped organizations that have taken on some of the most hard-to-crack problems in Israeli society. For example, it was instrumental in building a group that trains Ethiopian immigrants for tech jobs. In six years of operation, Tech-Career  has placed graduates in jobs throughout Israel's high-tech 'Silicon Wadi' companies. According to Tech-Career director Asher Elias, himself the son of Ethiopian immigrants, "all those who have gone through the course are working at well-paying jobs, mostly in programming. Some are making as much as NIS 20,000 a month."

That's remarkable for members of an immigrant community coming from a lifestyle and background so different from those of a modern, high-tech society. Now, as a mature 'start-up' training program, with the tools it needs to manage itself and raise funds for its training and job placement efforts, Tech-Career is considered a successful 'graduate' of IVN.

IVN currently works with organizations from a diverse spectrum of Israeli society. For example, there's Mishkan Hatchelet, which specializes in manufacturing prayer shawls (tallitot) and related items. The company is located in Beersheba, one of the fastest-growing cities in Israel as well as one of the poorest, with much of the population comprised of new immigrants, including many Ethiopian and Soviet Jews who have arrived in recent years.

While jobs tend to be few and far between for many of these immigrants, Mishkan Hatchelet is providing employment for more than 70 people in the area. Like other IVN clients, Mishkan Hatchelet is being mentored by a top executive (in this case, Ron Moritz, a 25-year veteran of companies like Symantec and Microsoft, who guides the organization in setting business policy, marketing its products, manufacturing efficiency - in short, everything the company will need to stand on its own two feet, expand its operations and provide more work in a job-starved region.


Entrepreneurial innovation for social impact

The strategy is successful with non-profits as well, Murvitz recounts. "One of our clients, Click-Savi, finds work for elderly people, including some who are housebound, making crafts, greeting cards, magnets, mobiles, and many other items. The workers enjoy having a sense of accomplishment, as well as the companionship of their fellow workers."

The organization sells the products in a retail store and on the Internet, and the money earned goes toward the running of other programs for the elderly, including social clubs, a day care center for disabled seniors, an occupational therapy program, and much more. A film made about a women's theater group at one of the senior's clubs can be viewed at the Culture Unplugged website.

Once again, IVN's impact is felt on the bottom line. "With the recession, the pie of donations to groups like this is smaller, so we see entrepreneurial innovation - using the tools of the marketplace to make a social impact - as the way to not only support groups like Click-Savi, but to ensure that they prosper," Murvitz relates.

"Instead of shrinking their services in response to smaller contributions, Click-Savi and many other groups have, thanks to the mentoring and guidance of IVN, been able to expand their services, learning how to manage themselves and develop markets for their products and services, with the income and profits plowed back into the organization to create even greater social impact," she adds.

Other clients include a group helping Bedouin women to commercialize their traditional weaving skills, a website that helps to match employers with job seekers, and a group that transforms organic garbage into high-quality compost.

Murvitz says that the beauty of IVN is that as each of these groups works with populations in need of help, IVN provides them with the tools they need to keep themselves in business, doing what they do best - which is helping their clients.

In a world where the 'cycle' is usually a vicious one, IVN's methods and strategies are helping to develop a much more positive social cycle - where the tricks and tools that have made so many Israeli businesses successful are now bringing that same success to Israel's less-fortunate, via the social service organizations dedicated to their welfare.

Third International Conference on Desertification to be held in Israel

For decades, Israel has been perfecting desertification solutions. With increasing soil erosion, salinization and groundwater mismanagement, it's time to share them with the world.

The conference, to be held from November 8-11, will be hosted at BGU's Sde Boker campus in cooperation with the UNESCO.

(By Avigayil Kadesh)

Prof. Alon Tal. (Photo: Dani Machlis)

In a country where 97 percent of the land is arid, the problem of desertification looms large. Over the past several decades, Israel has not only "made the desert bloom," as the saying goes, but has also invested major resources in learning how to keep dry lands from overtaking fertile soil.Many other countries were slow to understand the significance of this global crisis. Now that problems such as soil erosion, salinization, climate change and groundwater mismanagement have heightened awareness of the devastating effects of desertification, Israel is honing its expertise and offering it far beyond its own borders.

Ben-Gurion University of the Negev's (BGU) Prof. Alon Tal describes desertification as "the orphan of global environmental problems on our planet" because it was not high on most nations' list of priorities. But today it is acknowledged as one of the main reasons why more than 200 million people around the globe are threatened with poverty and hunger.

A catalyst for cooperation and collaborationTal, a desert ecologist at BGU's Jacob Blaustein Institutes of Desert Research at Ben-Gurion University (BGU) and founder of the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, organized the November 8-11 third annual International Conference on Drylands, Deserts and Desertification: The Route to Restoration.

The conference will be hosted at BGU's Sde Boker campus in cooperation with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). It is the second conference in Israel on the subject. More than 500 government officials and academics from 50 countries, including Palestinian and Jordanian delegates, will participate.

"We believe that by bringing a diverse group of academics, professionals and policy-makers together to confront the myriad critical issues of desertification, the BGU conference can serve as a meaningful catalyst for cooperative and collaborative projects in the future at the global level," says Tal.

Attendees will discuss the public health aspects of desertification; sustainable building in desert environments; remote sensing to assess how flora are responding to anti-desertification attempts; grazing and the Bedouin community; the future of the Dead Sea; environmental education and dry-land agriculture; and soil and water restoration.

The Israel triangleTwo years ago, forestry experts from several African countries participated in a three-day seminar on desertification. The event was initiated by MASHAV, Israel's Agency for International Development Cooperation, together with Keren Kayemet L'Yisrael - Jewish National Fund, and CINADCO, the Center for International Cooperation of the Ministry of Agriculture.


Israel's aridity index, showing the most arid areas of the country in the south


Participants gained pointers on establishing forests, collecting and germinating seeds, managing nurseries, and fostering forest-related industries such as honey production and ecological tourism, according to David Brand, head forester for KKL-JNF.

Israel also excels at wastewater management, a crucial aspect in fighting desertification. About half the water used for agriculture cycles through 240 KKL-JNF-built reservoirs. Israel reuses about 74 percent of its wastewater; in comparison, Spain, the second-most efficient country in this area, reuses only 20%.

Government agriculture officials from nations including Kenya, Ethiopia, Ghana, China, Nigeria, and Burkina Faso learned how Israel structures its efforts in a 'triangle' of research, advising, and fieldwork, Brand relates.
Tal strongly endorses this sort of information sharing. "If you do nothing about desertification, people will starve and die," he states. The UN, as well, encourages developed nations such as Israel to provide assistance to developing countries in fighting desertification.

Israel's moral obligation to provide expertiseWhat Israel has to offer is its proficiency in restoring marginal lands, and protecting its dry lands from further deterioration. Parts of the Negev desert have been transformed into a productive breadbasket, actually reducing the desert's size significantly since 1948. KKL-JNF planted forests are thriving and salt- and drought-resistant crops are flourishing thanks to advanced agricultural methods. The desert is dotted with commercial fishponds and with healthful algae used for manufacturing pharmaceuticals and health foods.

In fact, says Tal, algae grow better in dry areas. This is one example of how the desert setting offers advantages. Arid spaces are also perfect settings for solar and wind power, as well as trails for hiking.
Tal, a North Carolina native, works closely with Israel's neighbors. He co-authored a model for an agreement on environmental cooperation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and represents Israel at UN conferences on desertification alongside Dr. Uriel Safriel, professor of ecology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) and - according to Tal - a "true hero" who is the world's leading authority on desertification.

"Desertification is not, as it's often perceived, about vast sand dunes expanding and overwhelming villages," he says. "Although this happens in some places, it is simply a loss of soil fertility due to many factors whose long-term impacts are far greater in dry lands. This manifests itself in the scenes you see on television of millions of hungry people without food. Israel is recognized as a country which for some time has taken on the challenge of reversing these trends. Now, we have a moral obligation to be a light unto the nations and offer our capabilities."

Courtesy: MFA Newsletter, Israel.

Plants that produce genetically-engineered human collagen to heal

Plants that produce genetically-engineered human collagen to heal - a protein vital for tissue repair that is used by surgeons to fill bone voids in cancer patients, fix heart valves and heal severe wounds. 
 

(By John Bernard)

Tobacco plants could be used to produce genetically-engineered human collagen

In a greenhouse in northern Israel, a company is growing tobacco plants yielding a surprising product that is vastly different from cigarettes. These plants produce genetically-engineered human collagen, a protein vital for tissue repair that is used by surgeons to fill bone voids in cancer patients, fix heart valves and heal severe wounds. 

The genetic engineering technology that allows the tobacco plants to generate the collagen was developed by CollPlant (http://www.collplant.com/), based in Rehovot in central Israel.

This novel use of the tobacco plant answers a major unmet medical need.

A scientific achievement with commercial potential

"Collagen is used in about a thousand important medical products, but until now manufacturers have had to derive it from pigs, cows or human corpses," says CollPlant CEO Yehiel Tal, noting that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other international health regulatory agencies have expressed serious safety concerns with respect to the use of both animal and human corpse tissues.

CollPlant's plant-derived collagen poses no safety risks and can be considered a green technology, eliminating the industrial waste and ecological damage associated with the raising of livestock. In addition, the company is providing tobacco farmers with a healthier and more lucrative use for their crops.

"The leaves of a single tobacco plant can yield about 100 grams of tobacco (for cigarettes) or about a gram of genetically-engineered human collagen," says Prof. Oded Shoseyov, CollPlant's co-founder and the inventor of the technology. "And from a single gram of collagen it is possible to produce, for example, about three injections of highly-valuable wound healing gel for patients suffering from diabetic ulcers." 

In developing CollPlant's innovative technology, Shoseyov had to overcome a formidable scientific challenge. "Most proteins in the body are the result of a single gene but there are five different genes responsible for the production of collagen."

Shoseyov's success in transferring all five genes into a transgenic plant that could produce collagen was acknowledged earlier this year when he was awarded the prestigious Hebrew University Kaye Innovation Award for "scientific excellence with commercial potential."

Good news from the FDA 

CollPlant is well on the way to leveraging the commercial potential of Shoseyov's invention. The company has begun to market collagen as a raw material to Japanese manufacturers and in August received good news from the FDA about its first product.

"The FDA informed us that they have agreed to classify our Vergenix wound dressing as a medical device, rather than as a drug or biologic product," says Tal. "This is a breakthrough because the medical device regulatory review process is much simpler and quicker than that used for products defined as drugs or biologics."

Vergenix is just the first of several regenerative tissue products in the CollPlant pipeline that target the multi-billion dollar wound management market. These products include gel formulations for deep-tunneled wounds associated with diabetic ulcers, as well as wound dressings for acute and chronic wounds.

Other CollPlant products will attempt to meet the growing demand for collagen-based orthopedic products. In the US alone, each year there are about 800,000 ligament and tendon repair procedures, 400,000 shoulder operations and more than 500,000 bone graft procedures, all of which require collagen.  

CollPlant has received strong support from leading investors since its inception. Investment funds headed by two prominent healthcare industrialists, former Teva Pharmaceuticals CEO Eli Hurvitz and Perrigo founder Mory Arkin, were among the founding investors. Earlier this year the company began to trade publicly on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange

“People think, ‘If the police rolled him up, he must be guilty. If they got him in a court, he must be guilty.’

http://rt.com/Top_News/2010-06-20/death-penalty-darby-tillis.html

“Everybody gets something out of taking a man’s life” – campaigner

permalinke-mail story to a friendprint version

 

Published 20 June, 2010,

Following the execution of convicted murderer Ronnie Lee Gardner, the death penalty is once again dividing the US. Among the activists for the abolition is Darby Tillis, one of the first to be exonerated from death row.

He was arrested in 1977, found guilty of murder and sentenced with the death penalty. He was put in prison awaiting the execution. But it turned out he was innocent. He was released after nine years in jail. Ever since, he has devoted his life to the campaign against the capital punishment.


Darby Tillis says it is easier to find a “guilty” person quickly and convict him or her.

“It’s all about money, this criminal justice system, it’s about greed. We don’t have money to try death penalty cases,” he says. “Judges use it to build a political foothold. State attorneys write books, public defenders get on TV, policemen move up in rank. So everybody gets something out of taking a man’s life.”


Ordinary people do not go into details of a particular case, thus the death of an alleged criminal does not provoke many emotions, Tillis maintains. “People think, ‘If the police rolled him up, he must be guilty. If they got him in a court, he must be guilty.’ So they feel that one more bad person [has been] taken off the street.”

Courtesy: RT International Russian English TV Channel  [ http://rt.com/ ]

Anglo-American intelligence involvement in South East Asian insurgencies

KIM DAVY in Purulia arms dropping

KIM DAVY IN KENYA?

From The Week Magazine in India

By Subir Bhaumik

February 20, 2000

He has 46 passports and as many aliases; he speaks a dozen languages, including Hindu; and he can raise half a million dollars in no time with a couple of telephone calls. Small wonder, Jan Christien Neilson alias Kim Palgrave Davy alias Peter Johnson roams free while his hirelings who airdropped arms over Purulia in West Bengal in 1995 are behind bars.

British arms runner Peter Bleach and five Latvian aircrew were jailed for life on February 2, but Davy ? a slightly-built man with piercing eyes ? has remained elusive. There were reports that he might surrender to a court in native Denmark, but Bleach shrugged them off. "He is too big guys behind him to give up so easily. And the Indians have not done enough to chase him," Bleach told The Week minutes after the sentence was passed.

Few Indians have seen Davy, who vanished from Mumbai airport where the arms runners were forced to land on the night of December 21, 1995.

Now, the Ananda Marga sect, which has been absolved in the arms dropping case, has demanded a judicial inquiry into his mysterious escape act.

"We have good reasons to believe Davy was escorted away by Indian intelligence officials," said the sect's spokesman, Bhaveshananda Avadhuta.

According to Bleach's friend and former MP Sir Teddy Taylor, Davy has been seen in company of British and American intelligence officers and diplomats in Nairobi, from where they support Sudanese rebels against Khartoum. "They may be protecting Davy," Taylor told The Week.

At Hotel Sarina and Hotel Safari Club in Nairobi, Davy has also been seen with John Garrang, commander-in-chief of the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA). These Christian rebels in south Sudan have successfully fought Marxist and Islamic regimes in Khrtoum over the years.

The Americans, who have not hidden their love for the SPLA, apparently used Davy to fly weapons to Garrang on Soviet-made transport aircraft he purchased cheap. Unlike in Purulia, he did not airdrop the weapons since the SPLA controls a wide expanse of Sudanese territory. He could safely land.

But Davy is no mere arms dealer. He has his hand in minerals, gold and precious stones. In early 1995, his Howerstock International Trading Ltd commissioned a Filipino  geological consultant, Declaro Zafra and Associates, to survey the rich gold deposits in Kapoeta in south Sudan.

Zafra identified five distinct gold-bearing localities in Kapoeta and estimated the total recovery potential at some 12 million ounces. At $350 per ounce, it was worth $4,150 million. The rebels, who give armed cover during the survey, were to be paid royalties for each ounce mined.

Howerstock or any of the other companies owned by Davy had no presence in the mining world before he commissioned the survey. They were anyway too small to enter gold mining. Obviously, Howerstock was being funded by a global mining giant. Howerstock operates the mines, recovers the gold and brings it out of south Sudan through Kenya, which has given it an assay certificate legitimising the shipments.

Howerstock gold initially brought down prices in the global market. But the giant backing Howerstock was only test-marketing the gold, and prices again stabilised once it became known that it would take a few years for full scale mining to start. The mining giant was treading cautiously before heavily investing in a politically unstable country.

South Sudan offered Davy a weapon-mining-insurgent combination. Purulia has iron ore and coal mines in the vicinity, but no gold or diamond which he is interested in. But a weapon-mining-insurgent combination of interests exists further east, in the Kachin State of Myanmar.

The state has a powerful rebel army ? the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), FORMED IN 1961, FOUGHT Burmese forces for decades and maintained control over the northen region bordering India and China. The rich jade mines of Hpakam and Longkin are located in that area, which also has rubies and sapphires. The Kachin area is also supposed to have gold deposits.

In 1992-93, the Burmese army, beefed up with Chinese arms, launched a fierce offensive against the Kachins and compelled them to sign a ceasefire agreement. By 1995, it was clear that the military junta would not grant autonomy to the Kachins. The KIA chief Malizup Zau Mai went looking for arms and allies.

The Kachins could find some support in the eastern part of Arunachal Pradesh, even as India was trying to cultivate the junta. In April-May 1995, the Burmese army was involved in a holding operation during the Indian army's 'Operation Golden Duck' against a joint rebel column of the Ulfa and two other rebel outfits from Assam and Manipur.

So it could well be that a mining giant offered the Kachins weapons in exchange for permission to do gold and diamond prospecting in areas under their control. The Kachins were the ideal candidates for receiving a Purulia-like airdrop.

The Ananda Marga may be interested in securing a few revolvers, or even rifles, but only an outfit like the KIA, which takes on the Burmese army in set piece battles, would need anti-tank weapons. Bleach admits that the drop was not meant for the Ananda Marga, though Davy had been a Margi in the 1970s.

When the air traffic controllers asked the AN-26 to land in Mumbai, Davy burnt all his papers in a bin, but carefully left behind in the cockpit one of his old photographs with some Ananda Margis. This was perhaps to confuse investigations.

But how did the weapons land in Purulia if they had been meant for the Kachins?

Bleach says that when the parachutes came on board at Karachi for airdropping the weapons, the Latvian crew picked up a fight with Davy because they had been under the impression that they were carrying "technical equipment" to Bangladesh. During the rest of the flight, Davy wielded an AK-56 rifle to keep the Latvians under control, but Bleach says, "They were really angry and did everything to mess up the drop."

Bleach says the real drop zone for the weapons "was much further east". Davy had tried for landing permission in Dhaka, and sent his sidekick, Perter Haestrup, to "buy of the guys at Dhaka" with $50,000 but that did not work.

Why did Davy want to land in Dhaka unless the aircraft was planning to drop the arms further east? Flying out of Dhaka would make it much easier to drop over Kachin hills, an area considered difficult for fliers because of the "hump" there. So, was he trying to open a new arms supply route to Kachin?

Subir Bhaumik

(BBC's eastern India correspondent.)

=0=

The Arms Fixers                      Chapter 2

The Day it Rained Arms in India

That today’s control systems suffer from crucial failings is clearly seen from the following example of a complex illicit deal that went wrong. The main arms broker, a former UK intelligence officer, insisted that he had cleared the shipment with the UK military and police authorities – but things turned out rather differently.

In mid-1995, Peter Bleach, a military equipment broker living in North Yorkshire, heard from a Danish business friend who was living in Munich and trading in air services that another businessman he knew in Copenhagen was looking for a supplier of cigarettes.1 Bleach contacted the Copenhagen businessman. After some weeks of talking about the prices of cigarettes, the businessman said he wanted to broker the supply of 2,500 Kalashnikov rifles and 1.5 million rounds of ammunition. As is customary in arms deals, he did not disclose the destination to Bleach, but indicated that the quote should be for delivery to Calcutta port. Within days, Bleach said, he provided the businessman with a quote of $475,000 for purchasing and delivering AK rifles with ammunition to Calcutta. Payment was to be in advance, with a 100% irrevocable letter of credit. A few days later, the Copenhagen businessman agreed to the quote and invited Bleach to Copenhagen to sign the contract.

Peter Bleach, whose full name is Peter von Kalkstein-Bleach, was 46 years old at the time. He is a former corporal in British military intelligence and had served in the armed forces for over 20 years in, among other places, Southern Africa and Belfast. Although only three years in the arms brokering business, he knew that ‘The skill in defence trading is in dealing with the appallingly complicated paperwork – supplying goods is easy, anyone can do that.’2 He claimed that his own UK-based company, Aeroserve, had a licence to handle weapons from the UK Ministry of Defence.

The Third Man

According to Peter Bleach, he flew to Copenhagen to attend a meeting in early August 1995. His Munich-based friend met him and drove him to a waterfront house. There he met his Copenhagen customer and two other business associates, another Dane and a third man who, for much of the meeting, remained anonymous on the deck of the house. As discussions proceeded, the other Dane consulted the third man separately about the negotiations. Gradually it became clear that the delivery was not for the Indian government, but for an insurgent group.3 Bleach later said that he had to play along with the idea so as not to endanger his life, but that he had decided to inform the UK security services. He offered to work out another quote for the clandestine delivery. Then, to his surprise, before leaving he was introduced to the third man, but he was not given the man’s name.

The third man showed Bleach the area on a map where he wanted the illegal arms to be delivered. It was just inside West Bengal. Bleach says the man alleged that ‘his people’ were peaceful but had been killed and abused by forces of the Communist government of West Bengal, so he wanted the arms to hit back. Bleach advised that arms could be delivered to such an area only by parachute drop or by covert landing.4 He insisted that only the pilot who was to deliver the arms should know the ultimate destination. ‘I stressed from the very beginning’, Bleach recalls, ‘that, in order to be successful, it is most important that this resembles a perfectly, normal transaction in every possible way… No single contractor should be aware of the entire route.’ 5

Once back in the UK, Bleach says he contacted the Ministry of Defence through someone he knew in the Defence Export Services Organisation (DESO) and was put in touch with an official on the India desk, Colin Allkins, whom he fully informed of the secret plan.6 Bleach claims that Allkins promised to refer the matter to the relevant authorities and told him meanwhile to carry on as normal and gather as much information as possible. Bleach says he told his Danish contact to increase the quotation price by $50,000 to cover extra paperwork and bonuses for the aircrew. While Bleach was on a ‘normal’ business trip to Bangladesh, he received a faxed copy of a letter of credit from one of the Danish businessmen offering $470,000. The letter was issued by a Hong Kong bank and signed by ‘Kim P. Davey’– this turned out to be the third man. 7

Friends of ‘Davey’ apparently called him ‘Peter’, but Interpol now believes that his real name is Niels Christian Nielsen, born in Denmark in December 1961. He took the name Kim Palgrave Davey from a New Zealand infant who died at the age of five weeks and managed to acquire a New Zealand passport in that name after visiting New Zealand.8 Copenhagen police records show that Nielsen was arrested in May 1982 for two robberies and money laundering, but escaped. 9 Interpol had wanted him since 1982 and claimed that since 1988 he has used 46 false names and been involved in gold and drug smuggling, money laundering and counterfeiting $100 notes. Nielsen was described as a teetotaller and vegetarian, and a member of a religious sect,

Ananda Marga, founded in 1955 in India. This sect has been in dispute over land with the government of West Bengal for many years. The authorities there blame the sect for acts and threats of violence against Indian government personnel and property.

Bleach says he continued to inform officials at DESO by fax and to ask for help.10 On 14 and 22 September, and 8 December 1995, he met police Special Branch officers in North Yorkshire and told them about ‘Davey’ and his three Danish associates. 11 Bleach claims that the Special Branch officers responded by asking him to ‘continue the deal for the time being whilst they contacted the Danish and Indian authorities and decided what to do. They warned that they might want the delivery to take place so that they could identify the recipients and arrest as many people as possible. I agreed to this, provided that I could keep any money paid to me in order to compensate for my time and trouble – and they agreed to that.’ 12

At a second meeting with Bleach, one of the Special Branch officers, Ian Lynch, said he told Bleach to distance himself from the operation. Fearing the repercussions of pulling out of the deal, Bleach says he told Lynch that he would arrange the aircraft and crew for ‘Davey’ but make him deal with the arms supplier.13 It appears he told the Special Branch that ‘Davey’ had deposited around $460,000 in a letter of credit in London for the aircraft and for the purchase and delivery of rifles, pistols, ammunition, grenades and rocket launchers. ‘My assumption was the British would tell the Indian authorities right away. In fact they didn't tell them until the end of November 1995’, Bleach later protested.14 However, the local UK Special Branch officers continue to claim they told Bleach: ‘don't do it’. 15 Whatever the truth, Bleach continued to broker the deal.

On 24 September, Bleach and his Danish contact flew to Dubai and then on to Dhaka, Bangladesh, where Bleach said he had to attend to his ‘normal’ business.16 On 27 September, they flew to Bangkok to finalize the new contract. Bleach said his contact told him on the journey that ‘Davey’ was in charge of the operation; furthermore, that he was a very rich businessman based in Hong Kong who had made his money out of smuggling gold and electronic goods. His Danish contact also alleged that one of the other Danish businessmen had inflated the price to over US $600,000 with a $150,000 advance, but that ‘Davey’ had given the businessman only a few weeks to repay the money, failing which he would take out a contract on his life. 17

Attending the Bangkok hotel dinner meeting were ‘Davey’, his lawyer, his business partner, Bleach, his Danish contact, and an Indian called ‘Randy’. ‘Davey’ wanted to know if the arms could be delivered by ship and then taken by road to Purulia in West Bengal. But Bleach said he convinced him that this method was too difficult, and that it was much better to use an aircraft. If the aircraft were bought, it could be resold or used for other things, and it was this idea that attracted ‘Davey’. He wanted to base the aircraft in Dhaka.18

‘Davey’ arranged for Bleach to find a cargo plane to ferry the arms. This turned out to be an ageing Russian-built Antonov 26. A preliminary report of the Indian Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) claims that ‘Davey’ provided $250,000 to buy the freighter aircraft from the bankrupt Latvian Airlines – previously part of the USSR state-owned Aeroflot – and to hire the five-person air crew and two ground engineers for three months.19 Another report says Peter Bleach took $30,000 from ‘Davey’ to hire the services of the crew on the assumption that the plane would in future be based in Dhaka. 20 The Antonov 26 freighter was registered as AH 266 and was transferred to Carol Air Services Ltd, a company based in Hong Kong but registered in October 1995 in the Turks and Caicos Islands. Carol Air was reported to be a subsidiary of a Hong Kong company that had employed ‘Davey’. 21 The Russian-built plane was based for the time being in Riga, Latvia, home of the five-person crew. These were Captain Alexander Klichine, the 44-year-old pilot, Igor Moskvitine (navigator), Oleg Gaidach (co-pilot), Yevgeni Antimenko (cargo operator) and Igor Timmerman (flight engineer). They were each offered a salary of about $1,000 for three months, provided they would move in due course to Bangladesh. It is worth bearing in mind that the salary of a Latvian pilot is probably about one-thirtieth that of a pilot in Western Europe. On 21 November, the Antonov left Riga for India and Pakistan, but apparently did not visit Bangladesh.

By November 1995, Bleach was in touch with a UK weapons trading company, Border Technology and Innovations Ltd (BTI) of Hexham, England, to order the consignment on behalf of ‘Davey’.22 BTI claimed that it had agents in 22 countries in 1990 and has secured military and civil defence contracts in 15 countries including Angola, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Thailand. The company said that Bleach showed them what appeared to be a valid end-user certificate from the Bangladesh Ministry of Defence, but an invoice given to Bleach for the order mentions a request for parachutes: ‘Peter…Total price is $170,000…We need EUC quickly to effect licences. Payment: $85,000 in advance, balance by bankers draft. Commission: $10,000 is in this for you. Parachutes not available.’23

In any case, BTI did not need to apply for a UK arms export licence from the Department of Trade and Industry because, as with so many other UK-arranged arms deals, the firm would purchase the arms abroad and not bring them into UK jurisdiction. BTI turned to a well-known Bulgarian arms manufacturer, KAS Engineering, whose subsidiary, the Arsenal Company, was in a position to sell pistols and Kalashnikov rifles at low prices.24 Bleach later claimed that he distanced himself from the deal, put ‘Davey’ in touch with BTI and concentrated on finding the aircraft. 25

Collection and Delivery

On 10 December 1995, the Antonov landed in Burgas, Bulgaria, to collect the 77 wooden cases of arms.26 Bleach says that when he departed for Burgas from Gatwick a plain-clothed UK customs officer met him and said he knew of the deal, encouraging him to believe that the UK authorities were ready to intervene at the right moment. 27 At first, the old Antonov was grounded in Burgas because it was thought to be not airworthy. 28 Both ‘Davey’ and Bleach boarded the plane before it took off with the arms cargo and headed for Karachi. Bleach subsequently claimed that his decision to go on the arms flight was because ‘Davey’ had threatened to harm Bleach’s family if he did not board, since he knew too much. ‘I went to Bulgaria as the agent for the sale of the plane – I had nothing to do with the sale of the arms’, Bleach said later when he was arrested. 29

Flying from Karachi on 17 December 1995, the old Antonov lumbered towards West Bengal, landing at Varanasi to refuel.30 To Bleach’s surprise, the Indian customs and police authorities there took no steps to search the plane or arrest ‘Davey’ and the others. It then took off again headed for Rangoon. 31 Close to midnight en route over Gaya in West Bengal, the crew claim that ‘Davey’ suddenly ordered them at gunpoint to fly low over the villages of Purulia in order to drop the arms. Defiantly, they did not fly very low, but the arms cases were nevertheless dropped and landed miles off target, using parachute rigging that had been bought in South Africa. 32 Cases were marked ‘Technical Equipment’ and bore the name ‘Central Ordnance Depot, Rajendrapur Cantonment, Bangladesh’. 33 After the drop, the aircraft went back on track towards Rangoon, but was refused permission to land due to ‘poor visibility’. 34 It then headed back to Calcutta, refuelled and took off towards Phuket, Thailand, where the plane landed in the early hours of 18 December.

Seeing the parachutes falling from the sky, and finding with amazement the broken crates of arms and ammunition, the villagers of Purulia ran to tell the authorities, whose intelligence services had already been tipped off. Afterwards, it was revealed that on 10 and 17 November and 15 December 1995, the UK Home Office had reported the plan to their counterparts in India, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), and the CBI had taken over the case on 27 December, but the latter had obviously failed to intercept the freighter.35 A security memorandum of 25 November from RAW to the Indian Government stated that a European-based businessman had wanted to deliver arms to Communist rebels in West Bengal. It said he had bought an Antonov 26, visited Riga for that purpose on 15 November and would try to land it at the airstrip of a disused coal mine in Dhanbad, near Purulia, called Panchet Hill. 36 It would appear that by 17 December ‘Davey’ had discarded the idea of landing, in

favour of the parachute drop, but that for some reason the Indian authorities were not prepared to stop the flight.

On 21 December, the freighter re-entered Indian airspace supposedly en route to Calcutta, but because of ‘bad weather’ it changed course and landed at Madras, apparently to refuel for an onward journey back to Pakistan. Again, no action was taken by the Indian security services. It took off again at 10:45 p.m. the same night and headed for Karachi.37 Within two hours’ flying time from Pakistan, the old Antonov was ordered to land by Indian air traffic controllers because it was on an unscheduled route. It landed at Sahar airport in Bombay at 1:39 am on 22 December and was ordered to park at a remote side of the airport for refuelling. 38 It was an hour before Indian officials turned up. 39 ‘Davey’ simply walked off the Antonov and quickly disappeared, while Bleach and the five Latvians were arrested and jailed. According to Bleach, ‘Davey’ took advantage of the lax security at the airport. 40 A Sahar airport official who had investigated the aircraft on landing said he had no knowledge of the arms drop at Purulia until Bleach told him. Up until then, all he knew was that the plane had flown off course from Thailand. According to the Indian police, a computer laptop found on the plane apparently belonging to ‘Davey’ showed 49 places over which the plane intended to fly. 41

In the days after the arms drop at Purulia on 17 December, India’s news media were awash with speculation as to what had happened. Suspicion was directed mainly at Pakistan’s secret service once it was known that the aircraft had flown in from Karachi, while the West Bengali authorities denied having received a warning. Ananda Marga and the Bangladesh Government dismissed any involvement in ordering the arms, and some journalists speculated on possible links to arms for the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, but without proof.42 Meanwhile, the Bulgarian government issued a statement rejecting any responsibility for the supply of the arms. Even so, within two weeks the Indian Government decided to switch its purchase of 100,000 assault rifles from Bulgaria to Romania. 43 The Indian security and aviation authorities were accused of being inept, and an inter-agency panel set up by the government recommended strict monitoring of all unscheduled cargo flights, but stopped short of requiring all freight service agents to register their clients. 44

Peter Bleach and the five Latvians were transferred to a jail in Calcutta and charged on 24 December 1995 with ‘abetting the waging of war against India and criminal conspiracy’, a charge comparable to treason. The younger brother of ‘Randy’, Vinay Kumar Singh, was accused of waiting with his brother to transport the weapons and was also arrested and charged.45 Indian police arrested eleven Ananda Marga monks, including three US nationals and a Greek and Irishman, but they were released after no incriminating evidence was found. 46 The CBI continued hunting for several Indian nationals in addition to ‘Davey’, who was accused of running a network of corrupt officials in India.47 If Bleach and the crew were found guilty, the minimum sentence would be life imprisonment, while the maximum would be death by hanging. They also faced charges under the Arms Act and Explosives Substances Act and the aviation laws. 48 The trial, still proceeding in late 1999, was expected to take a long time to complete, with over 250 witnesses to be called.

Mystery Remains

Incarcerated, Peter Bleach continued to argue his innocence by saying that he was involved as an informer with the full knowledge of the British security services because they wanted to find out who else was involved before taking action. He produced faxes he had sent to UK government officials that he claimed would prove this. He alleged that the Indian security chiefs were warned long before the arms drop was made, but that they deliberately allowed the Antonov to shed its cargo in order to make political capital out of the result in West Bengal. One fax from Bleach to the UK MoD read: ‘I was informed that my quote was acceptable and I was invited to discuss the final details with the buyers, who were acting on behalf of the end-user. This turns out to be an illicit deal and the end-user appears at this stage to be an insurgent group in India.’49 Bleach also claimed that UK Special Branch officers had initially encouraged him to provide a delivery plane but advised him to stop short of supplying the weapons. Later, when he had found all the information they needed, Bleach says he was told to pull out altogether, but by then he claims it was too late because of his concerns for his and his family’s safety. 50 Bleach maintains that he always believed the plane would be stopped before the drop and – thanks to his help – his name would be quickly cleared.

Bleach and his supporters accuse the British government of a cover-up over his failed deal and have demanded a statement admitting its role. One of those collecting evidence for Bleach’s defence is his friend, Jo Fletcher. She says her efforts to help him were thwarted by Special Branch officers: ‘… the Police came round – twenty members of Her Majesty’s Constabulary – at six thirty in the morning, banged on my door. They took all the documentation that I had brought down from Yorkshire, they took piles of my own paperwork and they also took my computer, which they broke – and Peter’s computer...’51 North Yorkshire Police confirmed to the BBC that they did ‘collect evidence’ from Jo Fletcher’s home. According to the BBC, Ministry of Defence and Foreign Office officials could offer no contradiction to Bleach’s story. 52

Mystery remains as to the whereabouts and the exact role of Niels Christian Nielsen (alias ‘Kim Davey’), who has not been seen since his disappearance from Sahar airport on 22 December 1995. Apart from the Indian authorities, those in several European countries want Nielsen on charges ranging from armed robbery to counterfeiting. The Indian CBI told reporters that Nielsen had stayed in a hotel where he had made several phone calls to Bangladesh. They also believe that a Hong Kong-based businessman had financed the entire operation and that he was present in Riga with ‘Davey’ and Bleach when the deal to purchase the Antonov was struck.53 The CBI allege there were 14 others, including three Danes and a Bangladeshi military officer, who were involved.

On 17 January 1997, Indian police arrested a man on arrival from Singapore at Bombay’s Sahar airport in connection with the Purulia case. The man awaiting questioning was believed by the police to be Joel Proren and was alleged by them to have helped Nielsen with the funds to purchase the Antonov in Latvia. Proren was said to be part of a gold smuggling syndicate with Nielsen (‘Davey’) and several Indians linked to the Purulia drop, especially ‘Randy’– whom police thought to be Satyender Narain Singh, and whose younger brother Vinay had been arrested in connection with the Purulia drop.54 The police said Proren was German-born, but then a US citizen who was resident in Kansas. An official from the US consulate visited Proren. When travelling from Singapore, he had used the name of ‘Schneider Martin Conrad’, but had been using six names – Ken Sando, Roy Dogen, Martin Olsen and Joel Proren. Asked what his real name was, he replied: ‘Call me Hanu man.’55

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1     This account is drawn largely from quoted documents, and the words of Peter Bleach, particularly his account of the affair published as ‘The Copenhagen Connection’, Sunday (reprinted from Politiken, Denmark), 11–17 May 1997, but also from the following accounts: Pranay Sharma, ‘RAW had Warned About the Covert An-26 Mission’, The Telegraph, 25 December 1995; Harinder Baweja; ‘Straining Credibility’, India Today, 11 March 1996; Chandan Nandy, ‘Indian Mole May Have Fled to Colombo’, The Telegraph, 30 December 1996; Special Correspondent, ‘Vital Clues Unearthed in Purulia Case’, The Hindu, 24 January 1997; Richard  Norton-Taylor, ‘Gun Running Briton Faces Indian Death Sentence’, The Guardian, 21 August 1997; Stephen Grey, ‘Ex-soldier Abandoned after Tipping off Police’, The Sunday Times, 28 September 1997; Peter Popham, ‘I was Betrayed by MoD, Says Briton Facing Execution’, The Independent, 9 July 1998; Raymond Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes Make Arms Shipments Easy’, The Globe and Mail, 15 July 1998; Saheli Mitra, ‘The Mystery of Arms and Men’, The Telegraph, 13 January 1999; Oxfam UK, Out of Control, 1999; Anish Gupta with Sourabh Sen, Soumen Dutta & Summit Das Gupta, ‘A Twist in the Trial’, Special Report, Sunday, 30 May–4 June 1999; and Tyne Tees Television, ‘The Bleach Conspiracy’, 25 August 1999. Where important details vary, an attempt has been made to indicate a particular source.

2    Peter Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’.

3    Ibid. The other Dane has since denied that arms were discussed, claiming that they discussed the transport of prawns and turtles from Bangladesh to Hong Kong.

4    Ibid.

5    Peter Bleach, quoted by Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes...’.

6    Bleach faxed a detailed account of the planned operation to Colin Allkins at DESO on 18 August 1995, according to Gupta et al., ‘A Twist in the Trial’. DESO is part of the UK Ministry of Defence and employs about 700 staff to help UK arms manufacturers market and sell their products abroad.

7    Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’. Bleach subsequently told the UK police that the letter of credit was worth $460,000.

8    Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes…’.

9    The Hindu, 24 January 1997; Sunday, 11 May 1997; Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes...’.

10    Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’. A copy of Bleach’s fax of 18 August 1995 to Colin All-kins at DESO was published in Sunday, 1–7 January 1997.

11    Gupta et al., who quote from court evidence. Richard Norton-Taylor, ‘Army Told of Indian Arms Deal’, The Guardian, 12 September 1997, also quotes from Bleach’s correspondence, saying Bleach gave the UK police the precise grid reference for the arms drop.

12    Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’.

13    Tyne Tees Television, ‘The Bleach Conspiracy’.

14    Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’.; Peter Popham, ‘I was Betrayed…’.

15    Stephen Grey, ‘Ex-soldier Abandoned…’.

16    According to Caroline Lees & Simon Hinde, ‘Sky Full of Rifles Alerts Indians to Brewing Revolt’, The Sunday Times, 1 January 1996, Bleach had reportedly tendered to supply Russian-made helicopters to the Bangladeshi Ministry of Defence but had not won the contract.

17    Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’.

18     Ibid.

19    The Hindu, 24 January 1997.

20    Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes...’.

21    lbid. In addition, Oxfam, Out of Control, claims that shares of Carol Air were transferred to an investment company registered in the Isle of Man in November 1995.

22    Gupta et al., ‘A Twist in the Trial’. According to Oxfam and Grey, op. cit., BTI also had an address in Abingdon, Oxfordshire.

23    Oxfam, Out of Control. According to Grey, the Bangladeshi end-user certificate appears to have been a forgery. According to Bonner, Bleach claimed that BTI were paid $165,000 for the first shipment.

24    Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes...’.

25    Gupta et al., ‘A Twist…’.

26    Oxfam quotes from a fax ‘between’ BTI and Bleach on 10 November 1995 that defines the consignment from KAS engineering as 300 AK-47 Kalashnikov assault rifles, 15 Makarov pistols, two sniper rifles with night vision sights, 2 night vision binoculars, 25,000 rounds of rifle ammunition, 6,000 rounds of pistol ammunition, 10 RPG-7 rocket launchers, 100 anti-tank grenades, 100 ordinary grenades, and 25 PM79 anti-personnel mines. Another fax quoted by Oxfam from BTI to KAS Engineering [no date given] states that: ‘Commercial invoice should describe goods as "goods as per contract No. 046-HPS 10.11.95" to keep within the ideal of our Swiss Bank.’ Oxfam, Out of Control.

27    Tyne Tees Television, ‘The Bleach Conspiracy’.

28    Pranay Sharma reports the Indian aviation authorities’ allegation that the crew were allowed to make a trial ‘dry run’ flight to India in December 1995 before loading the arms for West Bengal, but this may be confused with the November flight from Riga. It appears that the crew and the Bulgarians were told the arms were for delivery to Bangladesh. Sharma, ‘RAW had Warned…’.

29    Popham, ‘I was Betrayed…’.

30    Norton-Taylor, ‘Gun Running Briton’. Lees & Hinde, ‘Sky Full of Rifles…’, report that Bleach said half the arms consignment was left in Karachi.

31    Gupta et al., ‘A Twist in the Trial’.

32    Tyne Tees Television, ‘The Bleach Conspiracy’.

33    Sharma, ‘RAW had Warned…’; Ashis A. Biswas, ‘Still in a Maze’, Outlook (India), 26 February 1997.

34    Gupta et al., ‘A Twist in the Trial’; Baweja, ‘Straining Credibility’.

35    Gupta et al. ‘A Twist in the Trial’.

36    Baweja, ‘Straining Credibility’. Michael Howard, the UK Home Secretary, confirmed in January 1996 that his officials had informed the Indian authorities of the plan.

37    Gupta et al., ‘A Twist in the Trial’.

38    Ibid.

39    Tim McGirk, ‘Would-be Hero Poisoned by his Own Sting’, The Independent, 11 September 1996.

40    For this account see Grey, ‘Ex-soldier Abandoned…’; Nandy, ‘Indian Mole…’; Bonner, ‘Legal Loopholes…’.

41    Mitra, ‘The Mystery of Arms and Men’.

42    Pranay Sharma, ‘Pakistan Suspected in Arms Drop’, The Telegraph, 22 December 1995.

43    Murali Krishnan & Sinjoy Chowdury, ‘LTTE Theory Gaining Ground’, The Telegraph,

30 December 1995; AFP, ‘India to Buy Arms from Romania’, 16 January 1996.

44    Murali Krishnan, ‘Pvt Air Services to be Combed’, The Telegraph, 30 December 1996.

45    The Telegraph, 11 December 1996.

46    Lees & Hinde, ‘Sky Full of Rifles…’.

47    Mitra, ‘The Mystery of Arms and Men’; Special Correspondent, The Hindu, ‘Vital Clues…’; Bleach claims that ‘Davey’ had bribed all the necessary police in India to ensure that his gold smugglers were released within 24 hours (Bleach, ‘The Copenhagen Connection’).

48    Special Correspondent, The Hindu , ‘Vital Clues…’; Tyne Tees Television, ‘The Bleach Conspiracy’.

49     BBC Radio 4, 11 September 1998.

50     Christopher Hudson, who visited Bleach in 1997, told BBC Radio 4 : ‘He was dealing here with hardened criminals who were anxious that he knew too much. These were not the men to go back on a deal with. Having entered it, he couldn't just back off – as the authorities claimed could happen. That isn't the way it’s done. Once you're inside the tent you stay inside because to venture out is to face death.’ Hudson also claimed that Bleach’s health was deteriorating in prison, with gangrene in his toes. ‘It’s a horrid, terrible prison. He has to defecate in a bucket. There’s a smell of raw sewage everywhere.’ The Latvian crew’s relatives complained that the prison conditions for their men were worse than Bleach’s, and that there were no legal representation or family or consular visits. Two of the men had serious medical conditions.

51     BBC Radio 4; Norton-Taylor, ‘Gun Running Briton’.

52     Ibid.

53     Staff Reporter, ‘Armsdrop Trial Begins Today’, The Telegraph, 1 August 1997.

54     Nandy & Murshed, ‘RAW Tip-off to Arrest Arms Drop Suspect’, The Telegraph, Calcutta, 22 January 1997; Special Correspondent, The Hindu, ‘Vital Clues…’; Mitra, ‘The Mystery of Arms and Men’.

55     Special Correspondent, The Hindu, ‘Vital Clues…’. Hanuman is the much-loved Hindu monkey-god who is invincible, the most intelligent being on earth and one of the very few Hindu gods who lives on earth in a physical incarnation at all times.

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Preface / Acknowledgments / Introduction / Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6 / Chapter 7 / Chapter 8 / Chapter 9 / Chapter 10 / Chapter 11

END OF DOCUMENT

25/11/1999 - NISAT