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Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

torrentfreak.com

71–80 of 84 posts

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#71
It’s sad the trolls seem to have gotten hold of this.

Torrent Freak has not even gone close to saying Sweden has bought him.

When countries give foreign aid, it is often, at least in part, for power plays.

Japan regularly does this in the pacific islands and uses their support to continue whaling. To argue the amount of money they give (quite large) is so they can continue whaling is also ridiculous. In fact most Japanese don’t even eat whale or care about the issue. It’s mostly political.

Sweden is owed a few favours and it seems they have called one in. The story here is why they have chosen this as one of them.

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#72

Ah, so the folks who were inexplicably sure that it had nothing to do with his Pirate Bay association were completely wrong. The good news, I guess, is that Swedish prison will likely be a less heinous experience.

> Ah, so the folks who were inexplicably sure that it had nothing to do with his Pirate Bay association were completely wrong. I know that was probably an emotional response and the phrase "correlation does not imply causation" ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_caus... ) gets thrown around here alot more than it should but that's a very strong statement to make. Is it possible that it's true,…

That phrase is total and utter bullshit. Correlation does not prove correlation but it does make it significantly more likely.

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#73
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the enlightening observation, but I'm already quite aware that TPB is in Sweden; nonetheless, the Swedish government has gone to what would seem to be extraordinary lengths to punish an offense that has had a minimal impact on its citizens, and rather disproportionate impact on outsiders. I ask again, what are the Swedes getting out of this?

Historically, Sweden has to rely on the US for defence vs a certain Bear in their neighbourhood. Even during the Cold War, their allegedly-neutral stance was really backed by US reassurances. Maintaining good relationships with their American friends is clearly seen by the establishment as worth much more than the life of a couple of nerds and some free movies.

Please back these claims up with some sort of references. Otherwise it's just utter bs

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#74

An aid package of 60 million dollars would be three times the amount they spent yearly on Cambodia in the last decade (with little variance). See [1]. [1]: http://www.openaid.se/en/countries/kambodja?year=2012

Coincidentally, it would be thirty hundred thousand times the amount I would pay to a local Cambodian corrupt cop to get that dude's ass on jail. With little variance. Point is, Swedish readers, you should vote me for chief prosecutor of your country. No, seriously. TorrentFreak here wants us to believe that Cambodia got 40G$ for arresting someone who is not precisely Pablo Escobar reincarnate. Do they seriously want…

You have experience paying money to corrupt cops in Cambodia? Are most cops in Cambodia corrupt? Did you already do that? Sounds interesting so could you elaborate?

Or have you never been to Cambodia and use HN to throw around racist comments about corruption in Asia?

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coincidentally, it would be thirty hundred thousand times the amount I would pay to a local Cambodian corrupt cop to get that dude's ass on jail. With little variance. Point is, Swedish readers, you should vote me for chief prosecutor of your country. No, seriously. TorrentFreak here wants us to believe that Cambodia got 40G$ for arresting someone who is not precisely Pablo Escobar reincarnate. Do they seriously want…

You have experience paying money to corrupt cops in Cambodia? Are most cops in Cambodia corrupt? Did you already do that? Sounds interesting so could you elaborate? Or have you never been to Cambodia and use HN to throw around racist comments about corruption in Asia?

Cambodia is ranked 164 out of 182 on the Corruption Perceptions Index list as of 2011, just slightly less corrupt than Libya. Not a very ringing endorsement.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#76
This is nonsense.

It is easy to make up a conspiricy, and very hard to disprove it. Nevertheless...

Sweden's foreign aid policies are well respected internationally[1].

For TorrentFreak to try and imply that aid to Cambodia - one of the poorest countries in the world - was in any way linked to their coincidental arrest of a person with an international warrant out for his arrest is shameful.

If nothing else, the foreign aid was announced prior to his arrest[2] and is part of a long running aid program[3].

Not only is it entirely made up, but it puts an unnecessary taint of corruption on a program that saves lives. As anyone scanning thread can attest, the last thing a foreign aid program needs is any kind of association with corruption - especially one that is made up.

It is well known that shoddy journalists can use their pulpit to smear anything they want and there is little that the target can do (eg, questions like "Tell me when you stopped beating your wife"). That is what is going on here, and people who are falling for it should be ashamed of themselves.

[1] http://www.thelocal.se/16158/20081205/

[2] http://www.sweden.gov.se/sb/d/574/a/94013

[3] http://www.swedenabroad.com/en-GB/Embassies/Phnom-Penh/Devel...

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#77
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sweden is one of few countries that reach the United Nations goal stating that countries should give one percent of their GNP as foreign aid. According to the reports I could find it is currently the largest giver of foreign aid in the world, with regards to it's economy and population. This wasn't spontaneous. It happens every year although the amounts changes as we see here.

Poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.

Sweden's foreign aid program is one of the best in the world[1], and doesn't fund rich people as you are implying here.

If you have proof otherwise I'd like to see it.

Otherwise - it's is way to easy to smear something in an off-hand way like that.

[1] http://www.thelocal.se/16158/20081205/

Re: Pirate Bay Founder Arrest Followed By $59m Swedish Aid Package For Cambodia

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Propaganda doesn't have to be "misleading" It does according to the dictionary definitions I'm reading. Going by your definition, any viewpoint can be "propaganda" as long as it's repeated often enough for an agenda. Civil rights comes to mind, where the agenda is equality, but you don't hear anyone but far-right wingnuts calling the repeated insistence that discrimination is wrong propaganda. It's a loaded term, bes…

From 189 million SEK in 2009 to 200 million in 2012. Yawn . http://www.swedenabroad.com/en-GB/Embassies/Phnom-Penh/Devel...

That seems at odds with the numbers others here have quoted from openaid.se, but that site gives me nothing but 'Application Error' when I try to figure out the reason for the disagreement between the two sources and I can't seem to get a Google cache for that page.
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