Missionary Renegade: Democracy Now! Daily Digest: A Daily Independent Global News Hour with Amy Goodman & Juan González for Monday, June 8, 2015

Democracy Now! Daily Digest: A Daily Independent Global News Hour with Amy Goodman & Juan González for Monday, June 8, 2015

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Traumatized by 3 Years at Rikers Without Charge, Ex-Teen Prisoner Kalief Browder Commits Suicide

young man imprisoned for three years at Rikers Island jail in New York without charge has committed suicide. Kalief Browder was a 16-year-old high school sophomore when he was detained on suspicion of stealing a backpack. Browder never pleaded guilty and was never convicted. He maintained his innocence and requested a trial, but was only offered plea deals while the trial was repeatedly delayed. After enduring nearly 800 days in solitary confinement and abuses from guards, Browder was only released when the case was dismissed. Browder died Saturday at his home in the Bronx. He was 22 years old. We are joined by Jennifer Gonnerman, a staff reporter for The New Yorker who was the first to report Kalief’s suicide. She originally recounted Kalief Browder’s story last year in her article, "Before the Law: A boy was accused of taking a backpack. The courts took the next three years of his life," and later published exclusive surveillance footage of him being beaten by guards and fellow prisoners.

Image Credit: Zach Gross for The New Yorker

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: "Hay Una Mujer Desaparecida", "A Woman is Missing", Holly Near and the late Ronnie Gilbert. Ronnie died on Saturday in Mill Valley, California. She was 88 years old. She cofounded the Weavers in the 1940’s with Pete Seeger, Lee Hays and Fred Hellerman. The Weavers helped popularize folk music and bring it’s message of social change to the world. The folk singer Arlo Guthrie said "she was one fourth of the weavers, which in and of itself would have qualified her with a badge of courage but she also continued throughout her life to stand as a beacon for anyone hoping to make the world a little more equal and normal for those too often told to stay on the fringes of society." This is Democracy Now! democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. A perfect segue into a very tragic end to our show. I’m Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We end today’s show with tragic news that Kalief Browder ha committed suicide. He was a young New York student who spent three years in Rikers Island jail without being convicted of a crime. On Saturday, Kalief took his own life at his home in the Bronx. He was 22 years old. In 2010, when he was just 16 years old he was sent to Rikers Island without trial on suspicion of stealing a backpack. Earlier this year, The New Yorker obtained explosive video showing the violence to which Kalief was subjected to there. Surveillance camera footage shows him being abused on two separate occasions. In one clip from 2012, the teenager is seen inside Rikers’ Central Punitive Segregation Unit, better known as the Bing. As a guard escorts Browder to the showers, Kalief appears to speak, and then the guard suddenly violently hurls him to the floor, although he’s already handcuffed. In a separate video clip from 2010, Kalief is attacked by almost a dozen other teenage inmates after he punches a gang member who spat in his face. The other inmates pile onto Kalief and pummel him until guards finally intervene. Kalief’s case led to calls for reforming New York’s criminal justice system.

AMY GOODMAN: On the night of his arrest, years ago, Kalief Browder was walking home from a party with his friends in the Bronx, May 15, 2010, when he was stopped by police based on a tip that he had robbed someone weeks earlier. He told Huff Post Live what happened next.

KALIEF BROWDER: They had searched me and the guy actually said —- at first he said I robbed him and I didn’t have anything on me, and that’s when -—

MARK LAMONT HILL: You say nothing, you mean no weapon and none of his property.

KALIEF BROWDER: No weapon, no money, anything he said that I allegedly robbed him for. So the guy actually changed up his story and said that I actually tried to rob him. But then another police officer came and said that I robbed him two weeks prior. They said, we’re going to take you to the precinct and most likely we are going to let you go home. And then I never went home.

AMY GOODMAN: That’s right, Kalief Browder did not return home for 33 months, almost three years, even though he was never tried or convicted. For nearly 800 days of that time, he was held in solitary confinement. He maintained his innocence, requested a trial, but was only offered plea deals while the trial was repeatedly delayed. Near the end of his time in jail, the judge offered to sentence him to time served if he entered a guilty plea, and told him he could face 15 years in prison if he was convicted. He refused to accept the plea deal, was only released when the case was dismissed. We’re joined once again by Jennifer Gonnerman, reporter, author, contributing editor at New Yorker magazine. She was the first to report Kalief’s suicide in her obituary for The New Yorker on Sunday. She first recounted Kalief Browder’s story last year in her article, "Before the Law: A boy was accused of taking a backpack. The courts took the next three years of his life." Welcome back to Democracy Now! Is it fair to say that the courts and the prison system actually took his life?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: I don’t know what was going through Kalief’s mind in those last few minutes, but it is without a doubt that he was completely traumatized by those three years that you talked about when he was trapped on Rikers Island, despite never having been convicted of a crime, brutalized by officers and fellow inmates alike, as your viewers saw in that video footage that you guys showed.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Now he had attempted suicide while in jail numerous times as well, and after coming out. Could you talk about that whole experience and process, and what he told you about that?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: Certainly. He spent about two years in solitary confinement on Rikers Island and attempted to end his life several times while he was there. And described some of those instances for me. And I wrote about some of it in The New Yorker. And then, after he was released, he was released in 2013, several months later he again made another very serious suicide attempt and spent about a week in a psychiatric hospital. And yet, he tried every day to beat back the nightmares and transcend what he had lived through and make up for all of this lost time. He was — in recent months he was enrolled at Bronx Community College and he was doing well. I spoke to somebody there yesterday. He had a 3.5 GPA for this semester, which is extraordinary. I mean, he lost his junior year and his senior year of high school while he was locked up. So every day he was grappling with sort of trying to move past what he had endured. But, I guess trauma was too much.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to turn to Kalief Browder in his own words. In this December 2013 interview with Huff Post Live’s Mark Lamont Hill, Browder talked about his suicide attempts at Rikers and his efforts to get psychiatric help.

KALIEF BROWDER: I would say I commited suicide about five or six times.

MARK LAMONT HILL: OK, you attempted suicide five to six times.

KALIEF BROWDER: Yes.

MARK LAMONT HILL: All while still in prison?

KALIEF BROWDER: Yes.

MARK LAMONT HILL: Wow.

KALIEF BROWDER: I tried to resort to telling the correction officers that I wanted to see a psychiatrist or counselor, something. I was telling them I needed mental help because I wasn’t feeling right. All the stress from my case, everything was just getting to me and I just couldn’t take it, and I just needed somebody to talk to. I needed to just — I just needed to be — I just needed to talk and to be stress-free. But the correction officers, they didn’t want to hear me out. Nobody wanted to listen.

AMY GOODMAN: That is Kalief Browder. Now, again, he went to jail when he was 16 years old. Never was tried. He was — the judge said he could get out if he just pled out, and he said, no, I’m not guilty.

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: And that moment actually happened — he had been locked up for over 2.5 years at that moment. So he had gone through all of this incredible trauma and was given a chance to walk out the door and almost anybody would take that opportunity. Just to get home. He refused. He said, I did nothing wrong. And he just wanted that trial.

AMY GOODMAN: He hung himself on Saturday?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: If there’s any positive sense of — that can come out of this, the reforms that have resulted, not only from his experience, but from your chronicling of his experience, could you talk about what the city of New York has tried to do in recent months to reform, especially, how it handles juveniles in its jail system?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: There has been a number of reforms or attempts at reforms in recent months. At the end of last year, the mayor eliminated solitary confinement for juvenile offenders on Rikers Island —

AMY GOODMAN: Because of Kalief?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: I think that was part of it. That wasn’t the only contributor factor. I mean the New York Times has been doing very aggressive coverage about the outrages on Rikers Island. But Mayor Bill de Blasio did cite Kalief’s case a couple months ago when he talked about a new initiative to try to speed up court cases, especially in the Bronx, but across the city. And that, sort of, excessive court delays that have been going on, that is part of the reason he spent so much time in jail there. Trying to address that. Now, whether these reforms are going to lead to lasting change, I don’t know. We can only, sort of, hope that, you know, that his death is not in vain and that real systematic change happens.

AMY GOODMAN: As we just briefly said what happened him in jail, aside from just being jailed at all, these videos that came out that we had you on for when they came out, very unusual to get a video from inside, a guard taking him down, the other prisoners beating him up.

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: I mean It almost defies belief. He had told me from the first moment I met him, stories about being abused on Rikers Island. And I never doubted him for a moment, but I think as an outsider, it’s almost impossible to believe what he lived through. And when you see it on the videos — I mean it was disturbing to watch those videos several months ago when we put them online, but to watch them now in the wake of what happened, I mean, it’s almost — it’s just unbelievable.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And you reviewed the videos with him before deciding whether to publish them or post them or not.

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: Right.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Could you talk about his reactions to seeing or reliving it through the video as well, what happened to him?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: From the first moment I met him, he said, Jen, you have to get that video from September 23, 2012 when this officer, sort of, threw me to the ground and assaulted me. And I thought, how am I going to get that video? And then I thought, how does he know the exact date? And he remembered — he had an incredible recall for details and dates and for what had happened him. And he knew that this assault had happened right on camera. And I sat next to him and he watched it a few months ago. On the one hand, it’s like incredibly disturbing to watch, and on the other hand, he was gratified that finally people were going to know exactly what happened to him. And it was just, the whole thing is just so disturbing. It’s almost beyond words.

AMY GOODMAN: Was he suing the New York City system?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: He has been for almost two years, had a lawsuit against New York City, against the Department of Corrections, the district attorney for his case, hoping to get some justice. And like his criminal case, his civil case has been dragging on and on. And he’s been through many days of depositions, which essentially means sitting in a room with city lawyers and being grilled about exactly what happened, including being grilled about his suicide attempts on Rikers Island.

AMY GOODMAN: So he is survived by his mom. Could you talk about his family? You spent this weekend, a number of hours there.

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: His family is very —

AMY GOODMAN: His mother is who found him.

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: Right. His family is very private and didn’t want to be public or talk publicly about what happened. But, as you can imagine, appeared to me completely devastated and confused and angry, as you would imagine, by this tragedy.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And was he under treatment for depression or was he on — had prescription drugs as a result of his numerous suicide attempts?

JENNIFER GONNERMAN: Yeah, no, he was getting some treatment and was on medication at the time and had been for many months.

AMY GOODMAN: Jennifer Gonnerman, your work in introducing the world to Kalief is so important and I’m so sad that we have lost him now at the age of 22. Jennifer Gonnerman is staff writer for The New Yorker magazine. She was the first to report Kalief Browder’s suicide in her obituary for him in The New Yorker on Sunday. She previously recounted Kalief’s story in the article headlined, "Before the Law: A boy was accused of taking a backpack. The courts took the next three years of his life." We will link to that story. That does it for our broadcast.

Protesters Press Secluded G7 Leaders on Harmful Policies, from Crippling Austerity to Dirty Coal

As leaders of the seven wealthy democracies known as the Group of Seven hold talks in a secluded castle in Germany, thousands of protesters have been met with 20,000 police in the largest security operation in the history of Bavaria. Issues on the G7 agenda include climate change, a $10.4 billion bailout package for Greece, and more austerity measures. We are joined by three guests: Gawain Kripke of Oxfam America, which just published the new report, "Let Them Eat Coal"; Eric LeCompte of the Jubilee USA Network; and former banker Nomi Prins, author of "All the Presidents’ Bankers."

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Climate change is a top agenda item as leaders of the seven wealthy democracies known as the Group of Seven, or G7, wrap up a two-day meeting in Germany today. Heads of state from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and the United States are holding talks in a secluded resort housed in a 100-year-old castle. Outside the summit, protesters have been met by a massive show of police force, with as many as 20,000 officers deployed for crowd control. Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets Saturday in the nearby town of Garmisch to oppose other issues under discussion, including the Transpacific Partnership trade deal, or TPP, and austerity measures. This is Stop G7 spokesperson, Benjamin Russ.

BENJAMIN RUSS: [translated] It’s totally over the top. And one has to see that the way we have been walking in the streets and have organized ourselves well. The camp was well organized. This massive police presence is totally over the top.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: On Sunday, leaders and reporters had to be shuttled to the G7 talks by helicopter after protesters blocked a main road. Today, the summit host, German Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, is seeking endorsement of goals to limit the increase in global temperatures and to provide financing to countries dealing with the impact of climate change.

AMY GOODMAN: Talks are expanding today with the addition of several African leaders, and Iraqi Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi, who is set to meet with President Obama. Meanwhile, a $10.4 billion bailout package for Greece has been a central focus among the country’s creditors attending the summit, including heads of the European Union, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is in attendance — is not in attendance. Neither is Russian President Vladimir Putin, as leaders agreed to continue sanctions against Russia over its aggression in Ukraine. Well for more we’re joined by three guests. Joining us from Garmisch, Germany, near the G7 Summit, is Gawain Kripke, the Director of Policy and Research at Oxfam. They’ve just published a new report called "Let Them Eat Coal" which notes the G7 countries remain major consumers of coal which is the biggest driver of climate change and world hunger. In Washington, D.C., Eric LeCompte is the Executive Director of Jubilee USA. He was recently in Dresden, Germany, for the G7 Finance Ministers gathering. And here in New York, Nomi Prins, former Managing Director at Bear Stearns and Goldman Sachs, and previously an analyst at Lehman Brothers and Chase Manhattan Bank, now a distinguished senior fellow at Demos. She is also the author of, All the Presidents’ Bankers: The Hidden Alliances that Drive American Power. Last week, Nomi Prins was invited to address global central bank leaders at the Federal Reserve and IMF’s annual conference. We welcome all of you to Democracy Now! Let’s first go to Garmisch, to Bavaria to Gawain Kripke. Can you talk about the massive protest that is going on outside, met by an even larger police presence, believed to be the largest police operation in Bavarian history? Why people are protesting the G7 summit, Gawain.

GAWAIN KRIPKE: Well, it’s a very energetic protest. It started in Munich a few days ago and then has moved up here to the mountains. It’s a wide diversity of complaints that the protesters have against the G7. I would say the biggest one that I observed was a real concern about the real free trade agreement that is being negotiated between Europe and the United States with a concern among the protesters that it would be pushing lower standards for things like energy efficiency and food safety onto European markets. So a real resistance to that trade agreement from the protesters. But also, protesters concerned about climate change, about global poverty, and a range of other issues.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And on the issue of global poverty, what are some of the concerns that you feel from Oxfam are not being addressed by the summit?

GAWAIN KRIPKE: The G7 have always fashioned themselves as the board of directors for global development and the global economy. So we always look to them to make new commitments and statements about ending poverty and reducing hunger. We’re hoping for something ambitious from the G7 leaders. This is a very important year for global poverty and also for climate change with very big conferences scheduled for later this year. And the G7 can really put a lot of energy into those efforts if they make some commitments here. We’re looking for them to say something about the richest and most developed countries will take actions to reduce their climate change, to provide funding for less developed countries to also develop in a clean way and also to end hunger, which is going to be one of the big goals that is going to come out of the U.N. later this year in which the world is going try to end hunger by 2030.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you describe the scene for us there? The G7 meeting in this 100-year-old castle, and the massive police presence outside along with thousands of protesters?

GAWAIN KRIPKE: Right. Well, it is very beautiful for one thing. It’s a great location that the Germans picked for the G7. The castle is quite remote and we can’t even see it from where we are. Most of the protesters and nonprofits and most media are actually located some distance from the castle. So we see it on TV, but we’re not really observing it. The protesters are in the streets. They have an encampment a few miles away that is, I’m told, very orderly. There’s been some big rainstorms, so I think it’s a bit muddy. But their protesters have been going around the streets in a very festive way and laying out their concerns. The police presence, what I’ve seen, is pretty restrained but massive and looks very highly militarized. They’re marching down the streets in columns looking like soldiers. But I haven’t seen a lot of rioting or excessive abuse myself

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’d like to ask Nomi Prins, one of the biggest issues is debt and what to do about Greece and in general the restructuring of the banking system of the world following the 2008 crisis. I’m wondering, you’ve spoken to the IMF recently. What is the main message you’re trying to send to those who are dealing with financial reform?

NOMI PRINS: One of the things I talked about in Washington last week, to the Fed and the IMF and the central banks, bankers around the world, is that there is a continued instability, which some of them know and some of them refuse to admit, in the financial system throughout the world. And that has had a knock-on effect on global economies everywhere. There was a decision made by central banks, by private banks and governments together at the highest levels of these countries to help the banking system at the expense of the people system, the real economy, to invoke austerity measures in order to pay bondholders. And that continues to be in place. So when you talk about the situation in Greece, what Greece is basically saying and has been saying for a long time is that, look, are the austerity measures that you pressed upon us are irrational, are impossible to use relative to the fact that our economy has slowed down and our debt, the strings attached to the bailout that we received in order to pay bondholders, in order to pay the IMF and central banks and so forth, are impossible to pay. But yet, they continue to facilitate stability for the financial system and the major banks around the world. So they are getting the money, they are getting the benefit. People in the countries outside of that upper echelon are simply getting hurt.

AMY GOODMAN: You have written about Clinton cash. Can you explain what that means and what it actually has to do with what we’re talking about today? What it has to do with the G7, what it has to do with banking in the United States and multinational banking.

NOMI PRINS: Well, Clinton Cash was a book that came out recently by Peter Schweizer where he looks at some of the Clinton Foundation associations with countries and I go further into examining what their associations are with a major banks in these countries, particularly from the United States. And if you follow a two decade through line from when Bill Clinton became president through Hillary Clinton now trying to become president, you see that the relationships along the way with Bank of America, with Citigroup, with Goldman Sachs and so forth, whether through appointed positions, whether through money along the side, whether through pushing their policies of deregulation and benefit to the banks at the expense of the rest of the population, they continue to go through. So in the beginning we had deregulation coming in through the Clinton administration. We had the the Glass-Steagall Act being repealed which meant these bigger banks could become bigger and consolidate people’s deposits with all of these risky derivatives and other types of transactions, which then imploded the financial system in the wake of the financial crisis, that still exists.

Relative to the rest of the world, the biggest six banks in the United States are bigger than they were before the crisis. They’ve received more help from Obama’s government which has a lot of people in it from the administration, from a treasury perspective, and they continue to thrive at the expense of the real economy. In addition, the foundation, the Clinton Foundation has received from $250,000 to $5 million donations from these same largest institutions, among others, that continue to push their agenda throughout the United States as well as throughout the world.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But do you think that real structural change has occurred since — ? We still get information or news about the LIBOR exchange conspiracy, the currency manipulation. We see continued crime after crime in the financial world and doesn’t seem to be any real structural change occurring.

NOMI PRINS: No, absolutely. And that was one of the things that said in Washington. Basically, and also, the big six banks in the United States, they’re hoarding cash. So the result of these zero interest rate policies throughout the world emanating from the Fed and the United States and this quantitative easing are buying bonds back from all these banks, giving them more money, is they have 400 percent more cash after the crisis than they had before, not going into the real economy and they’re committing crimes. The big six banks in the United States have paid fines or settled to pay fines for $120 billion to $130 billion. LIBOR rigging, FX rigging, mortgage fraud, money laundering, it goes on and on.

AMY GOODMAN: So we just saw the US Attorney General Loretta Lynch with this big announcement about FIFA, the whole soccer scandal. Person after person in the leadership of FIFA have now been indicted. Right before that was the allegations about banking fraud. Now, we’re not talking person after person, in fact, we’re not talking anyone. We’re talking about institutions, banks. Can you address this as a person who worked at many of these banks from Lehman to Goldman Sachs?

NOMI PRINS: First of all, the FIFA thing is a scandal, is such a nonevent relative to the fact that we had a, just recently, that $5.6 billion fine on FX rigging. That means rigging the currencies, these five banks including J.P. Morgan, Citigroup and the United States, UBS and Barclays, they got together and rigged what people pay for goods back and forth. They engendered harm to the global economy. They got a $5.6 billion fine, compared to $150 million fine, nowhere in the same vicinity, for FIFA and heads rolled. No heads rolled. Jamie Dimon got a $20 million increase in his compensation, voted upon by his shareholders right before that FX rigging find came out.

AMY GOODMAN: And what would it mean? You lived within this culture. Why aren’t people indicted? Why aren’t people sent to jail? And what would it mean for what happens inside these banks if they were?

NOMI PRINS: I think it would make a big difference if the heads of these banks, and I mentioned, if some of the CEO’s would actually be sent to jail, be held accountable in any personal way whatsoever at all. Instead they’ve been able to point fingers inside their institution. That trader did it, that was sort of a bad department, that was a bad apple approach. And they continue, Jamie Dimon and Lloyd Blankfein, they continue to run these companies. And globally, again, these banks have committed more crime and been settling for more crimes than anywhere else in the world. It would make a difference. It would send a message that you can’t do that. But not only have they not been sent to jail, not only have they not had any personal indictments or convictions, they also continue to get upholded by their shareholders here, which actually isn’t something — in Europe they’ve kicked out some of the bankers and CEOs along the way, by shareholders.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’d like to bring in Eric LeCompte of Jubilee USA Network. The issue of coal. We have heard over the weekend of Norway’s Sovereign Wealth Fund deciding to divest in coal investments. Could you talk about the G7 nations’ role in the issue of coal?

ERIC LECOMPTE: Well, I think the entire role of the G7, as they describe it themselves, is to focus on global economic growth. When we’re looking at these particular issues around divestment, I think we also see a lot of connections between what Nomi was just describing in terms of how the global banking system is operating as well as what Gawain described as some of chief concerns from protesters on the ground being TTP, these trade agreements, as well as an overall negligence to really addressing global poverty issues. Right now when we look at Greece and we look at the developing world, when we look at the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and others, wanting to promote a higher degree of austerity in Greece in order for them to receive more bailout funds, we have to understand that fundamentally, we’re dealing with a problem of global instability. And In fact, when the G7 financial ministers met last week in Dresden, when I was in Dresden, the chief focus, how the table was actually set for this G7 summit, the financial ministers focused on the issues of high debt, and being able to achieve growth in what is now considered by the G7 and International Monetary Fund to be unsustainable debt, unsustainable debt that will prevent economic growth.

I think, as we’re looking at the Greek situation, we’re looking at these broader issues of divestment, I think we need to see some real shifts in terms of how the global financial system operates. And I think one of the issues that was very interesting that’s now been at the table at the United Nations with three general assembly votes in favor of global bankruptcy process, they’re working on a process, the International Monetary Fund for the last two years has been working on a process. Last week in Dresden, we saw all of the major religious leaders, the Catholic bishops, the Protestant bishops call on the G7 to end poverty by bringing stability, by erecting a global bankruptcy process to end poverty. And in fact, at the prayer service last week in Dresden, we saw German Finance Minister Schäuble attend because we know these issues are so key right now, we do need to see some solutions if we’re going to have greater stability in the markets, in the global financial system.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But in terms of this whole issue of a global bankruptcy regime, what about the issue of the ability of so many corporations to hide their wealth and profits in tax sheltering countries?

ERIC LECOMPTE: And this is an incredible concern. We have to understand that debt and tax are flip sides of the same coin. Two years ago at the Lough Erne Summit, we saw the G7 take some historic action. They called on broad ways to curb corporate tax avoidance, to be able to stop these anonymous shell corporations, which around the world are hiding these funds. And although we’ve seen some action, much of it has just been talk so far, I think at this particular summit, we’ve also heard that they’re reviewing these issues. This last summer here in Washington, President Obama and the White House hosted a very important Africa summit and one of the main drives that came out of that summit is the curbing of corporate tax avoidance evasion and corruption because right now, the developing world is losing $1 trillion a year to these illicit financial flows, to tax evasion, to corruption. And we’re looking at the question of Greece right now. We have to say that these issues are very much connected.

Certainly, more austerity plans for Greece are not going to work. They can’t be part of the recipe. And there needs to be some real debt relief like we saw in 1953, ironically, with Germany when Germany had, what Germans call the Wirtschaftswunder, the economic miracle. That was a direct result of the 1953 London accord where all of the lenders, all of the creditors were brought together to London, not only was Germany given debt relief, but more important, Germany was given what the Greeks are asking for right now. And that is not even necessarily debt relief. It is to be able to extend those payments further in the future so that money can be invested in the people now. And that also deals with this tax issue, Juan, that you’re bringing up, because have to understand that in Greece, there are issues in terms of corruption and tax evasion that although the government has done a better job of collecting these monies, they need to also improve this in the future so that they can get out of the debt trap.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to take a break in a minute and we’re going to stick with Eric LeCompte and Gawain Kripke who’s in Bavaria right now. But Nomi, your final comment, as you leave, for what is most important for people to assess what comes out of this G7 summit?

NOMI PRINS: I totally was nodding to everything Eric was saying. That there has to be a moving over, of supporting the global financial system at the bank level, to supporting the global real economy at the foundation level, at the people up level. And whether that’s debt relief, bringing in taxes so they are not off shelter, de-leveraging the banking system, making it more transparent, cutting up the banks, making them responsible, because they’ve gotten all of this help, to the real economies. All of that has to be part of the play, otherwise, this continues and it just continues to hurt the economies least able and least getting all of the help from the top.

AMY GOODMAN: Nomi Prins, thanks for being with us. Former banker, author of, All the Presidents’ Bankers: The Hidden Alliances that Drive American Power. We’ll go back to Bavaria to speak with our guests. We’ll be speaking with Gawain Kripke of Oxfam America, about the issue of coal and Eric LeCompte with us in Washington, D.C. Stay with us.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: The Weavers, "If I had a Hammer." Singer Ronnie Gilbert died on Saturday in Mill Valley, California. The great folksinger was 88 years old. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez. We are still with Eric LeCompte, Executive Director of Jubilee USA Network. He was most recently in Dresden, Germany for the G7 finance ministers gathering. And we are joined by Gawain Kripke, the Director of Policy and Research at Oxfam America. He is currently in Garmisch, Germany for the G7 summit, a little ways away from this castle where the Group of Seven wealthiest democracies are meeting. Juan?

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Gawain Kripke, I wanted to ask you — I should more properly have asked you about the issue of the G7 and coal and their relationship to, as they’re discussing climate change, their relationship to coal production worldwide.

GAWAIN KRIPKE: The G7 leaders come here every year and say that they want to tackle climate change. And then at the end of the day, their communiqué says very little. You heard President Obama earlier in the program mention climate change as one of the big issues that they are going to take up at the G7. Chancellor Merkel has talked about climate change being a key issue for this G7. Other leaders have said so. We want to see some real action. This is the year to do it. Oxfam has been calling on the G7 leaders to commit to phasing out coal from our energy portfolio. And it’s quite feasible to do. Coal is no longer the cheapest option, in a lot of cases, but it’s certainly the dirtiest option. And by our calculations, it’s quite feasible for the G7 countries to phase out coal and make a big step toward solving the problem of climate change. We made that call before they started, and we’ll see what they do when they come out of the G7 summit. We’ll know within an hour what they’re going to do. We don’t expect them to take the big step they need to. So it all rings a little false when leaders come here and say they want to tackle, change and don’t do much.

AMY GOODMAN: So Paris, France is coming up. That’s in December. That’s the U.N. climate summit. That’s different from the others, back to more like what happened in Kyoto. It’s going to be a binding summit. What is Oxfam America calling for and how is this laying — setting the table for that?

GAWAIN KRIPKE: The first thing to recognize is that, historically, climate change is a problem caused by developed countries. In the room at the G7 is — are leaders representing 50 percent of the carbon in our atmosphere right now. So these guys have a special responsibility to help solve this problem. Developing countries have been coming up and they’re producing more climate change, but the problem started in rich countries and the solution should start in rich countries. So we’re calling on developed countries to do things like phasing out coal, make big commitments to reducing our carbon implant — their carbon emissions, and also to providing the funding necessary for the world’s economy to move to a zero carbon energy sources and to adopt — adapt to the climate change that we know is going to happen.

Many of the poorest countries and many of the poorest people are very vulnerable to changes in the weather. Most farmers in Africa, for example, depend on the rain. They don’t have irrigation. So if the rain changes, they’re really in trouble. And we think that the richest countries in the world that are here have an obligation to help poor people in poor countries adapt to climate change. We are calling on them to make commitments in Copenhagen. Leaders said that they would provide $100 billion a year to make these transitions. So far that money hasn’t been coming.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: On Sunday, White House a spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters, Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel discuses Greece in their bilateral meeting ahead of the G7 summit.

JOSH EARNEST: As it relates to Greece, I will say that there is unanimity opinion in the room, that is was important for Greece and their partners to chart a way forward that builds on crucial structural reforms and returns Greece to sustainable long-term growth. We are pleased that we’ve seen similar indications from the Greek government and there, obviously, is a deadline that is looming and the president is certainly hopeful that Greece and their partners will be able to chart this path without causing undue volatility in the global financial markets.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Eric LeCompte, Greece keeps being discussed. And here at this summit, they’re not even there, obviously, at the table. Your thoughts on this issue of the G7 again trying to urge Europe to resolve the ongoing, months long, now, crisis with Greece?

ERIC LECOMPTE: We have to understand, just as some background in terms of the Greek situation, we look at Greece as one of the most terrible examples of how the global financial crisis impacted our world. The further we get away from the crisis of 2008, all economists tend to agree where getting closer to the next crisis. And our inability to deal with the Greek situation illustrates a greater inability to deal with the global situation. In 2010, instead of dealing with the severe debt problems that took place in Greece, the can was kicked down the road where emergency financing was given which mostly bailed out the private sector, German banks, and others, without really dealing with the problem. Intense austerity measures were put in place in 2010. And those measures, now, the International Monetary Fund agrees, are essentially, what drove about a third of the entire population of Greece under the poverty line. Greece, now, instead of dealing with those problems in 2010, is the third most indebted country of the world. And right now, what leaders are talking about are more financing as opposed to dealing with the debt situation head on.

We have to understand that Greece also exemplifies what went wrong with the global financial system. And although world leaders are not firmly agreeing on solutions, they’re all agreeing on the problems. And we see those problems in Greece. That the Greek crisis was caused because of combination of an unsustainable debt load and speculative, extreme risky investment. We see that in the mortgage crisis, back here at home in the United States, we see it in developing countries having food security issues and it becoming a global economic crisis.

The question now, what should be done about Greece? What needs to be done moving forward to not only address the Greek problem, but to promote real global stability? Well, in Greece, more financing isn’t necessarily the answer. We saw last week the Greek government say that they’re going to bundle their IMF payments to the end of this month, about 1.6 billion euros. They delayed a payment, about €3 million, $218 million last week, as a negotiating tactic. We have the Greeks and we have the G7, we have the Germans, the European Central Bank playing a poker match with people’s lives. What’s happening right now is a negotiation of how much austerity for financing the Greeks are willing to take.

But we go back to what happened in 1953 with the London accord where we saw a real global bankruptcy process that led for the economic miracle for Germany to become one of the strongest economies in the world. And we see that as a model for the Greek situation. That we can have a global bankruptcy process that not only can be applied for Greece, but now for the financial system, stem risky investment behavior and start to get debt loads around the world in a more sustainable place.

AMY GOODMAN: Eric, it’s not only that Germany has taken the lead in going after Greece on debt, but the G7 is taking place in Germany. And Alexis Tsipras, the head of — the Prime Minister of Greece is not there, as Putin is not there, though other leaders like the Prime Minister of Iraq are meeting, for example, with President Obama today. What is the significance of this?

ERIC LECOMPTE: I think it is very significant. We have to understand that just last week, Greece was considered to be a part of the official agenda of the G7 and then on Friday, we saw it removed. We know it dominated the conversation yesterday. But part of what we are seeing by the G7, is to some degree, a snub of Greece. We’re seeing the Obama administration align with the other G7 countries, and starting to take a harder-line approach with Greece. And although what the White House has continually said about working together, about keeping Greece in the eurozone, not necessarily turning to austerity as the solution — these are positive things, but we have to understand that with the summit being hosted in Germany, that right now Merkel, along with the other G7 leaders, are snubbing Greece and trying to play hardball with them.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And is it your sense that there can be a deal worked out here or is it likely that the default will move forward in terms of Greece?

ERIC LECOMPTE: We are certainly really concerned, because we do recognize there is a real opportunity here to be able to do something different, to be able to turn away from austerity, to be able to start to invest in people and not to invest in banks. Not to say that the markets should drive what is happening, but as Pope Francis has pointed out, it’s not about markets, it is about people. So we do see that there is a real opportunity. We see there are models. We see at some points there have been positive conversation. I think the concern we have right now is at the end of the day, from conversations that we’ve also had with governments and seeing how these kinds of issues are moving forward, that the Germans and others are perhaps willing to just push Greece outside of the eurozone and perhaps look at some of these policies for greater stability in the future. Because even though Greece is happening right now, even some of the G7 countries them self and some of the wealthiest countries of Europe from Italy to Spain are dealing with these serious debt issues. So we have even heard acknowledgments from the German government that eventually, they do want to create a bankruptcy process, at least for the eurozone. But in the short-term, we might see the Greeks getting pushed out and them bearing the brunt of what has been a problem of the making of the banks in the private sector.

AMY GOODMAN: Eric LeCompte, we want to thank you for being with us, head of Jubilee USA Network, and Gawain Kripke speaking to us from Bavaria. Oxfam America who released "Let Them Eat Coal," which notes the G7 countries remain major consumers of coal which is the biggest driver of climate change and world hunger. This is Democracy Now! Stay with us for our next segment, the tragic news that a young man here in New York that was held without charge for three years at Rikers, much of that time in solitary confinement — he went in when he was 16 years old, supposedly, for stealing a backpack which he said he never did. Kalief Browder has just committed suicide. Stay with us.

Headlines:

UN: 20 Million Yemenis Need Aid; Saudi Strikes Kill Dozens

The United Nations say 20 million people, 78 percent of the population, need urgent humanitarian aid in Yemen. That’s an increase of 4 million from just three months ago. Aid agencies have urged Saudi Arabia to ease a naval blockade depriving Yemen of basic goods. Saudi Arabia has also failed to hand over any of the $274 million dollars it pledged to the UN emergency humanitarian fund for Yemen in April. The news comes amid continued fighting between Houthi rebels and rival forces backed by the Saudi-led coalition. On Sunday, dozens of Houthi-allied soldiers were killed in an airstrike in the capital Saana. Saudi Arabia also shot down a scud missile fired by Houthi forces across the border from Yemen. This comes days after a Saudi airstrike in Saada province killed at least 50 people, most of them civilians.

Thousands Protest G7 Summit in Germany

President Obama is joining other world leaders in Germany today as the G7 summit comes to a close. Heads of state are holding talks in a secluded resort inside a hundred-year-old castle. Outside the summit protesters have been met by a massive show of police force, with as many as 20,000 officers deployed. Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets Saturday in the nearby town of Garmisch. On Sunday, leaders and reporters had to be shuttled to the G7 talks by helicopter after protesters blocked a main road. Issues under discussion include climate change, austerity, Greece’s fiscal crisis, the Transpacific Partnership trade deal, and what President Obama called "Russian aggression" in Ukraine.

Turkey’s Ruling AKP Loses Parliamentary Majority

Turkey’s ruling party has lost its parliamentary majority in a major defeat for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The Justice and Development Party, or AKP, still won the most seats, but lost legislative control for the first time in 13 years. The result will thwart Erdogan’s bid to increase his presidential powers. The pro-Kurdish HDP party won seats for the first time after appealing to Erdogan’s leftist and secular opponents.

Pakistan Cleared 8 of 10 Convicted for Attack on Malala Yousafzai

Pakistan has acknowledged it has cleared eight of the ten people convicted for the attempted murder of Pakistani education activist Malala Yousafzai.

In 2012, Yousafzai was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman who boarded her school bus. She survived serious wounds and now continues to campaign around the world, winning the Nobel Peace Prize last year. In April, Pakistan said 10 men had been sentenced to life imprisonment for the attack. But Pakistan now says eight of them were actually acquitted due to a lack of evidence.

Mexico: Ruling PRI Keeps Congressional Majority Amid Protests

Protests broke out in parts of Mexico on Sunday as the country held midterm elections. Both striking teachers and relatives of 43 students missing since last year burned ballots in acts of anti-government unrest. The PRI party of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto retained its congressional majority though with a smaller number of seats.

Thousands Call for Honduran President’s Resignation over Corruption Scandal

Thousands of people have rallied in Honduras calling for the resignation of President Juan Orlando Hernandez over a corruption scandal. The protesters turned out after Hernandez admitted his election campaign received donations from companies linked to social security embezzlement.

Protester: "We are protesting against impunity and corruption. We will not stand for criminalisation and insecurity. This country is collapsing, public enterprise has been disarmed, this government cannot do anything. it must be removed."

Hernandez has denied any personal involvement in the payments.

Lashing, Prison Sentence Upheld for Saudi Activist, Blogger

Saudi Arabia’s top court has upheld the controversial verdict against activist Raif Badawi. Badawi was arrested in 2012 after setting up a website for political and social debate. He was sentenced in January to 1,000 lashes and ten years in prison.

Sister, Friend Identify former High School Student as Hastert Victim

Two people have come forward with specific allegations of child molestation against former House Speaker Dennis Hastert. Hastert was indicted last month on federal charges of lying to the FBI and illegally paying $3.5 million to hide alleged "misconduct." FBI sources say Hastert was making payments to a former student to conceal sexual abuse that occurred during Hastert’s previous career as a high school teacher and coach in Illinois. Now the sister and a classmate of another former student, Stephen Reinboldt, have identified him as at least the second potential victim of Hastert’s abuse. The unidentified friend spoke to NBC News.

Unidentified: "He started to talk about his relationship with Denny Hastert, and told me that they had been sexual. And I was flabbergasted. I said, what do you mean? And he said, well, we would do things sexually, and it would sometimes start with a massage."

Meanwhile Stephen Reinboldt’s sister, Jolene Burdge, said she found out when Reinbolt told her he was gay.

Jolene Burdge: "I asked him, ‘When was your first same-sex experience?’ He looked at me and said, 'It was with Dennis Hastert.' I was stunned. And he just turned around and kind of looked at me and said, 'Who is ever going to believe me?'"

Reinbolt died of AIDS in 1995. According to Jolene Burdge, Hastert showed up at her brother’s funeral. She says she confronted Hastert about the abuse.

Jolene Burdge: "He just stood there and stared at me. Then I just continued to say, 'I want you to know your secret didn’t die in there with my brother. And I want you to remember that I’m out here and that I know.'"

The former student whom Hastert was paying has not been identified. According to CBS News, authorities believe there could be a third victim. Hastert served as speaker of the House from 1999 to 2007, making him the longest-serving Republican speaker in history.

Thousands March Against Tar Sands Pipelines in St. Paul

Thousands of people marched in St. Paul, Minnesota on Saturday in a show of opposition to tar sands pipelines. Organizers focused on calling for the cancelation of the proposed Sandpiper pipeline, which would run near pristine water reserves. Saturday’s action is said to be the largest anti-tar sands rally in the Midwest to date.

2 Convicted Murderers Escape Maximum-Security NY Prison

A manhunt is underway in New York after two convicted murderers escaped from a maximum-security prison. The prisoners used power tools to drill through the walls and break out of the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora. Charles Guess of the New York State Police said the pair may have had help.

Charles Guess: "We’re leaving no stone unturned. It’s been approximately 36 hours since these inmates escaped. They could be literally anywhere. Although we have notified our partners in Canada, the ports of entry across the northern border, certainly every law enforcement agency in the Northeast. They could be out of state, but they still could be holed up here in Dannemora. We do not know if they had access to a vehicle, but we presume that they may have had access to a vehicle, as well as they may have received assistance in their escape effort, if for no other reason at least, outside the secure perimeter of this facility."

It’s the first escape from Clinton’s maximum-security wing in its history. Governor Andrew Cuomo has declared the manhunt a "crisis situation."

Texas Officer Suspended After Harsh Arrest of Black Teens at Pool Party

A Texas police officer has been put on leave after video emerged of him wrestling an African-American teenage girl to the ground, pulling her hair, and pulling his gun on another teen. The officer was helping respond to neighbors’ complaints about a disturbance at a party the teens were attending at a local pool. Several African-American teens in attendance say a dispute only broke out after local white residents voiced anger at their presence. The video appears to show the officers singling out the African-American teens.

Death of Black Prisoner in GA Prison Ruled a Homicide

A coroner has ruled the death of a 21-year-old Nigerian native in a Savannah, Georgia jail cell a homicide. Matthew Ajibade died on New Year’s Day of what the coroner described as “blunt force trauma,” including “abrasions, lacerations, skin injuries about the head and some other areas of the body.” At the time of his death, he was restrained in an isolation cell after authorities said he became combative during an altercation which injured three deputies. Last month, nine Chatham County deputies were fired in connection with his death. Meanwhile the graphic, full video of a Salt Lake City, Utah police officer shooting an unarmed man last summer has been released. The video shows Officer Bron Cruz approaching Dillon Taylor as he walks away from him with headphones in his ears. Cruz shouts at Taylor to get his hands out, then opens fire as Taylor appears to raise his hands.

Graphic Video Emerges of Utah Police Shooting of Unarmed Man

Meanwhile the graphic, full video of a Salt Lake City, Utah police officer shooting an unarmed man last summer has been released. The video shows Officer Bron Cruz approaching Dillon Taylor as he walks away from him with headphones in his ears. Cruz shouts at Taylor to get his hands out, then opens fire as Taylor appears to raise his hands. Cruz then handcuffs Taylor and searches his pockets as blood gushes from his chest and abdomen. The shooting took place two days after the killing of Micheal Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The Salt Lake County district attorney ruled it justified, saying Cruz reasonably perceived a threat.

Immigrant Teen Mom Attempts Suicide at Texas Detention Center; Pregnant Mothers Freed

An immigrant teenage mom has attempted suicide at a private Texas family detention center after being denied asylum. Nineteen-year-old Lilian Olia Yamileth has sought refuge with her four-year old son in the U.S. to escape severe domestic abuse in her native Honduras. But after her bid was denied, she cut her wrist and left a suicide note saying she has been "treated worse than an animal." Doctors say her wound is non-life threatening. The Karnes facility holds about 500 immigrant women and children. Last week, Karnes released five pregnant women just hours after their detention there was revealed.

Obama Delivers Eulogy at Funeral for Beau Biden

A funeral was held on Saturday for Beau Biden, the late son of Vice President Joe Biden. Beau Biden died last week of brain cancer at the age of 46. President Obama delivered the eulogy.

President Obama: "It’s no secret, that a lot of what made Beau the way he was, was how much he loved and admired his dad. He studied law like his dad, even choosing the same law school. He chased public service, like his dad, believing it to be a noble and important pursuit. From his dad he learned how to get back up when life knocked him down. He learned that he was no higher than anybody else, and no lower than anybody else."

Ex-Prisoner Jailed without Charge at Rikers for 3 Years Commits Suicide

And a young man imprisoned for three years at Rikers in New York without charge has committed suicide. Kalief Browder was a 16 year old high school sophomore when he was detained on suspicion of stealing a backpack. Browder never pleaded guilty and was never convicted. He maintained his innocence and requested a trial, but was only offered plea deals while the trial was repeatedly delayed. After enduring nearly 800 days in solitary confinement and abuses from guards, Browder was only released when the case was dismissed. Browder died last week at his home in the Bronx. He was 22 years old.

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