I suppose we can get drunk on Guinness and ethno-nationalism once a year

this all sort of falls apart if you are aware that St Patrick was a Brit bsky.app/profile/mayo...

INVESTIGATION: Indonesian firms targeted in a palm oil fraud probe supplied European firms, an investigation by AFP and SourceMaterial (@Source_Mat) has found.

The European firms include Italian energy giant Eni and Finnish sustainable aviation fuel leader Neste

u.afp.com/SLMh

Indonesian exporters in palm oil probe supplied European fuel majors Indonesian exporters targeted in a palm oil bribery probe supplied major international companies, a SourceMaterial investigation has found.

New: Last month, Indonesian authorities arrested 11 people on suspicion of bribery and disguising palm oil as a less strictly regulated byproduct.

SourceMaterial can reveal that exporters targeted in this probe supplied major international companies.

www.source-material.org/indonesian-e...

Plastic Patriots – SourceMaterial Ineos, the controversial chemicals giant that turns fracked gas to plastics, trumpeted its return to the UK. Its billionaire owner, Jim Ratcliffe, appears to be less patriotic about his taxes For thos...

A reminder that Ratcliffe was knighted after returning with Ineos from Switzerland… but was already scouting for properties in Monaco.

The honours committee felt they had been had. “When he buggered off I personally was incandescent”, a source said.

www.source-material.org/plastic-patr...

'UK has been colonised by immigrants', says INEOS boss and Man Utd co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe In an interview with Sky News's Ed Conway, Sir Jim says Britain faces profound political, social and economic challenges, among them an unprecedented rise in immigration in recent years.

In fairness Jim Ratcliffe, of Monaco, and formerly of Zug, Switzerland, knows a thing or two about moving to a country for economic advantage.

news.sky.com/story/the-uk...

UK car output at its lowest in 70 years, but there is a spark of hope The government’s target of getting production back up to 1.3 million by 2035 looks increasingly unlikely — unless the Chinese get involved

The year before the EU referendum, the UK car industry was predicting record production of 2 million units a year by 2020.

It's kind of mad how little political weather this makes. www.thetimes.com/business/com...

Rosa is ridiculously talented and lovely to work with. Sign her up before it's too late.

Major Tory donor sanctioned over role in Russian oil trade The government sanctioning statement alleges that Murtaza Lakhani’s activities in the oil sector have supported the Kremlin

A major Tory donor has been sanctioned in the UK and EU for his alleged role in the Russian oil trade.

The oil magnate Murtaza Lakhani was hit with a UK asset freeze and travel ban on the grounds that his activities were assisting Russia.

www.thetimes.com/uk/law/artic...

Morning after: Boris Johnson recovers from Lebedev’s exotic Italian party Exclusive: New prime minister refuses to say if he abandoned security for 2018 night in billionaire’s castle

www.theguardian.com/politics/201...

I wonder if the SEC is taking an interest.

I wonder has Boris Johnson ever seemed in need of assistance while boarding a flight. bsky.app/profile/flyi...

BREAKING: Our fake Chinese AI investor bought access into heart of Labour government Ex-Tory MP facilitated meetings with 10+ Labour MPs and met ministers in “cash-for-access operation”

🔴 BREAKING: Our fake Chinese AI investor bought access to 10+ Labour MPs and minister

Brand new investigation by Democracy for Sale and Led By Donkeys.

democracyforsale.substack.com/p/breaking-o...

Amazon has twice as many data centres worldwide as previously reported Amazon uses far more data centres across the globe—and has a bigger impact on the environment—than previously reported, leaked data reveals.

Amazon, the biggest data centre provider in the world, is actually *even bigger* than we thought.

New investigation based on leaked documents by my colleague @lukewbarratt.bsky.social. www.source-material.org/amazon-data-...

Drax Shares Surge on Data Center Hopes Drax Group Plc shares surged to their highest level in over three years as investors bet that UK utilities could become major beneficiaries of the country’s rapidly expanding data center industry.

Coal-fired data centres at least sound a bit steampunk. Wood-fired data centres just sound deranged. finance.yahoo.com/news/drax-sh...

North Sea Storm – SourceMaterial Poised to take control of ‘the backbone of the UK’s energy production’, Franceso Mazzagatti is defending allegations bribery, forgery and fraud

Can't recommend today's SourceMaterial offering enough, by @marcusleroux.bsky.social.

It's the story of the son of a lorry driver from Calabria who has often struggled to distance himself from the Italian mafia and is now poised to buy 11 North Sea gasfields

www.source-material.org/mazzagatti-v...

North Sea Storm – SourceMaterial Poised to take control of ‘the backbone of the UK’s energy production’, Franceso Mazzagatti is defending allegations bribery, forgery and fraud

Francesco Mazzagatti is awaiting approval to buy a terminal that provides a fifth of Britain's gas.

We took a close look at episodes in his career that experts say ought to be of interest to the regulator in charge of stewarding the UK's oil and gas.

www.source-material.org/mazzagatti-v...

"Transparency is a one-way door". A leaked Amazon document reveals its anxiety over disclosing how much water their data centres use.

Dubai Heir, Congo Air - Village Magazine When Paris police picked up a drunk Australian carrying €195,000 in cash, they uncovered an alleged money-laundering scheme led by a Dubai-based Irish horseracing heir linked to British royals.

this is a dizzying yarn with a drunk Australian getting hit by a car in Paris at its centre and threads leading to the dictator of Congo-Brazzaville and a prominent Irish family via Monaco and Dubai. villagemagazine.ie/dubai-heir-c...

I'd love to have attended the meeting where this came up.

At dawn in Accra, Ghana, Lydia Bamfo (51) sets out to collect plastic waste. For 25 years she’s battled the tide of rubbish overwhelming her city. Now she says the World Bank’s “solution” has done nothing to help workers like her. 🧵

William of Ockham: we're gonna need a bigger blade.

Hundreds of German fans march through Lurgan before football tie is completed after 65 years Hundreds of German football fans marched through Lurgan today before a European tie was finally completed - after a 65-year wait.

'Veit Barthel took time out to sample some Buckfast - declaring that it made him “feel fantastic”.' 🥹www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/sport/football/european/...

Irish League and German clubs to fulfil European Cup tie, 65 years later Glenavon's 1960-61 European Cup tie against East German champions Wismut failed to go ahead due to the Cold War.

Some heartwarming football content from earlier in the week. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

The real trouble with Kneecap The perils of the single transferable victim

On the Kneecap website you can buy a £25 “RUC not welcome tee”, in reference to a police force that was reformed and renamed before Mo Chara was in primary school.

marcusleroux.substack.com/p/the-real-t...

A lie can be half way around the world before a preliminary crisis analysis has its trousers on.

Fresnillo faces $630m demand to restore 'illegally-mined' gold – SourceMaterial The goldmining giant lost access to a Mexican mine in 2013 — now a court-appointed review says it must return $630m of gold it mined there.

Fresnillo, one of the UK’s largest mining groups, has been told it should pay as much as $630 million to a Mexican community whose land it illegally mined for gold, according to documents obtained by SourceMaterial →

www.source-material.org/fresnillo-so...

Gerry Adams denies under oath that he was the senior IRA figure released for talks in 1970s Former Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams has denied under oath that he was the senior officer of the Provisional IRA released from internment as a precondition for talks with British officials about a ceas...

I wonder if this cross-examination is building up to the 1976 Republican News column where Adams wrote, cryptically: "I'm an IRA volunteer". www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/courts/...

unless the next page is a restaurant bill or a particularly tricky invoice, I'm not sure what use the calculator is

Does Isabel Oakeshott still believe Arron Banks was “used by the Russians”? Oakeshott is a Reform cheerleader but in 2018 she said the Kremlin “struck gold” with the party’s West of England mayoral candidate. The article is still online.

Isobel Oakeshott is a Reform cheerleader - but in 2018 she said the Kremlin “struck gold” with Arron Banks, who Reform’s West of England mayoral candidate. The article is still online.

New from @marcusleroux.bsky.social on Democracy for Sale

democracyforsale.substack.com/p/does-isabe...