23 FEBRUARY 2002

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I t emerged that a company controlled by Lakshmi Mittal, who

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had given £125,000 to the Labour party, was given a £70 million loan by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, partly underwritten by Britain, in order to buy a...

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RAILTRACK OF THE SKIES

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T here are few sights more nauseating than that of a trade union leader trying to say `I told you so'. When the news came through that the National Air Traffic Services (Nats)...

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Memo to Blair: sack Prescott, sack Byers, sack Irvine and move Jack Straw

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PETER OBORNE here was an intermission at Westminster last week. MPs went back to their constituencies, or off skiing. Life returned to normal after three weeks of frenzied...

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MIRIAM GROSS

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W ith every year that passes, the Oscars are taken more and more seriously and given more and more coverage by the media. Not very long ago it was still possible to read a...

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THE PROFITS OF DOOM

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Matt Ridley celebrates Bjorn Lomborg, the environmentalist brave enough to tell the truth that the end is not nigh AT the Christmas cabaret in the politics department of...

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Mind your language

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I KNEW someone would help. Mr Rob McWhirter from Guildford writes to tell me that the most notorious exponent of the word sweet in the context "jaminy, lucky-day" is the...

AUNTIE DROPS HER KNICKERS

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Tim Allan says we all pay for BBC trash television FLICK through last week's Radio Times and you will find that one channel was showing some pretty remarkable programmes. If...

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ATOMIC BRITAIN

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David Fishlock sees signs that this country is converting to nuclear power LATE summer found me on the pretty new pier at Southwold in Suffolk, gazing south at a dome that...

Second opinion

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AS IS well-known, complaints rise to meet the procedures set up to investigate them. Given this fact, it is not altogether surprising that, despite the many legitimate grounds...

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THE RAPE OF EUROPE

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Thomas Braun on a truncated map and the threat to ancient numismatic symbols of British identity THERE is no such continent as Europe. It is a misconception of the pioneer...

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ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY

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Mark Steyn takes issue with EU Marshal Chris Petain, Stephen Glover and other sodaphobes New Hampshire SAY what you like about those wacky Islamofascists but at least they...

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A weekly survey of the things our rulers want to prohibit

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GORDON BROWN has made much of his targeted tax cuts. There has been rather less trumpeting of a disturbing new trend: targeted taxes, whereby small groups of society are singled...

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IDENTITY CRISIS

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Jonathan Ray helps the Scarborough police with their inquiries I WAS strolling along the prom at Scarborough minding my own business. The sun was hot, the ice-cream was cold...

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DOWN WITH ONCLE SAM!

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Jo Johnson on France's latest bout of anti-American paranoia Paris THE high priests of French anti-Americanism are back. Anyone doubting this should take a look at Jean-Pierre...

Ancient & modern

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THE two main political parties have announced that they are jointly going to attack cynicism. So that's the end of Prime Minister's Question Time, then. More urgent, however, is...

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Scotland

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Magnus Linklater I HAVE a boyhood memory of a hot summer's day in the Highlands. We are tramping through knee-high heather on a steep hill overlooking Loch Duich in Wester...

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Tit for tat and the fury of a squirrel with an Einstein brain

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PAUL JOHNSON P rofessor Pepperberg, a delightful lady from MIT, told an American conference last week that she can teach a parrot, Alex, to recognise 50 objects, to count, to...

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It was the biggest wedding buy-up since John got the exclusive rights to the Marriage at Cana

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FRANK JOHNSON At the time of writing, OK magazine's relevant issue is not yet in the shops. Exclusive rights to the photographs of the ceremony and reception marking Miss Joan...

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Christians v. Jews

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From Mr Piers Paul Read Sir: As a lifelong Christian, I was interested to read Melanie Phillips's account of 'replacement theology' (Christians who hate the Jews', 16 February):...

From Mr Israel Shamir Sir: As an Israeli writer living

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in Jaffa, witness the other side of Jewish-Christian relations carefully omitted by Miss Phillips. While the Hebrew Bible is respected in Europe, in Israel the New Testament is...

From the Revd Peter W. Lockyer Sir: I understand and

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share Melanie Phillips's concern about the vein of antiSemitism that has existed in the West and some sectors of the Christian Church. It is surely right for all people of good...

From Dr Daleep Mukarji Sir: The suggestion behind Melanie Phillips's

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article was that Christian Aid has been infiltrated or otherwise influenced by those espousing anti-Semitic views. We deny that idea completely. Christian Aid's mandate is to...

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Wimpish Catholics

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From Mr Robert O'Brien Sir: Paul Gottfried is right (`The Church and the Holocaust', 16 February). It is not the Ozicks and Dershowitzs who most effectively peddle this absurd...

Parents' choice

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From Mr Paul R. Taylor Sir: Anonymous 'government scientists' and Doctor Andrew Wakefield continue to dispute the 'safety' of MMR (Leading article, 9 February), but with no...

It's safer abroad

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From Mr F.P.N. Lake Sir: Simon Heffer's article ('Cowardy custards in the home of the brave', 9 February) covering the Americans' panic over terrorism prompts me to make a point...

Youth appeal

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From Sally Osman Sir: Thankfully, Greg Dyke — unlike Stephen Glover (Media studies, 16 February) — realises that society has changed somewhat, and that the BBC is there for...

African revival

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From Mr Keith Arrowsmith Sir: John Papworth's sweeping diatribe against former colonial rule in Africa (Letters, 9 February) is unjustified. I was one of the last British...

Opinion breeds ignorance

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From Mr Andrew Ian Dodge Sir: Besides having a crude rant at the wrong audience, Howard Veit (Letters, 16 February) made a howler of a mistake. This error demonstrated the...

Soldiering on

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From Mr Hairy Whitbread Sir: I refer to Bruce Anderson's article ('Is this how bin Laden escaped?', 16 February), about the difference between the US and the British attitudes...

Snow business

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From Sophie Hall Sir: Francis King (Books, 16 February) says that 'almost all Snow's novels are now out of print'. I respectfully offer a contradiction to this comment on the...

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How does Labour survive sleaze? With a little help from its media friends

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STEPHEN GLOVER A cording to a YouGov poll in the Sunday Times, New Labour is now regarded as being sleazier than the Tories. Yet an ICM poll in the Guardian suggests that...

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The pot and the kettle

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Justin Ma rozzi ISLAM'S BLACK SLAVES: A HISTORY OF AFRICA'S OTHER BLACK DIASPORA by Ronald Segal Atlantic Books, £20, pp. 241, ISBN 0374227748 S Lavery, wrote the 19th-century...

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Approaches and escapes

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Carole Angier FLIGHTS OF LOVE by Bernhard Schlink, translated by John D. Woods Weidenfeld, £12.99, pp. 308, ISBN 0297829033 T here can be few readers who have not heard of The...

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An old bohemian, amoral and fiercely moralising

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Frederic Raphael THE CHAMELEON POET: A LIFE OF GEORGE BARKER by Robert Fraser Cape, £25, pp. 573, ISBN0224062425 ho reads, or remembers, George Barker today? Even I was...

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Where once there was no time

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Emma Tennant ROAD TO THE ISLES by Derek Cooper Macmillan, £16.99, pp, 247, ISBN 0333901002 0 n the occasion of my first — and only visit to the Hebrides in 1963 I found many...

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Losing the thread of life

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Nicholas Harman THE FORGETTING: UNDERSTANDING ALZHEIMER'S by David Shenk HarperCollins, £15.99, pp. 290, ISBN 0002571749 D can Swift, the master of despair, pretty certainly...

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Falling out of love with music

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Fiona Maddocks SELECTED LETTERS OF WILLIAM WALTON edited by Malcolm Hayes Faber, .130 pp. 526, ISBN 0571201059 WILLIAM WALTON: THE ROMANTIC LONER by Humphrey Burton and Maureen...

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Secrecy in a bleak bunker

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M. R. D. Foot THE SECRET STATE by Peter Hennessy Allen Lane/Penguin, £16.99, pp. 234, ISBN 0713996269 KGB LEXICON edited by Vasiliy Mitrokhin Frank Cass, £35. pp. 451, ISBN...

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Music's poor relations

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Stephen Pettitt on the difficulties composers face trying to earn a living C omposers are badly paid. It is a fact of their lives. Even some of the more prominent names find it...

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Aelbert Cuyp (National Gallery, till 12 May)

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Time of enchantment John Spurhng A elbert Cuyp at the National Gallery is the best possible antidote to the dismal halls of Warhol at Tate Modern. Both artists lived through...

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William Beckford, 1760-1844: An Eye for the Magnificent (Dulwich Picture Gallery, till 14 April)

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Pursuit of excellence Ruth Gtulding I n 1844 20,000 people lined the streets of Bath to watch the funeral cavalcade of William Beckford make its way to the Abbey cemetery,...

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Mother Clapp's Molly House (Aldwych)

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Language problems Toby Young N ow that I've been doing this job for three months I can say without hesitation what the single greatest shortcoming is of contemporary British...

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THE SHIVA NAIPAUL MEMORIAL PRIZE 2002

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'When I won the first Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize, it was gratifring for me on every level. I had already begun to publish, but this was a big step in my career. It helped me...

Gems of compression

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Robin Holloway T he first number in Hugo Wolf's Italian Songbook, praising little things — the costly pearl, the wholesome olive, the fragrant rose — sweetly converts 'small is...

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Spiritual yearning

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Charles Spencer bit of you dies in winter, and you don't realise it until spring begins to stir. And as the sap begins to rise again, one's thoughts turn to love and...

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La Bayadere (Royal Opera House)

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Morbid fantasies Giannandrea Poesio M arius Petipa's 1877 La Bayadere is to ballet what Giuseppe Verdi's 1871 Aida is to opera. The parallel is anything but casual, given...

Six-Pack (Bridewell Theatre)

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Handful of fun Michael Tanner T etc a Tete is a small company, founded in 1997, for bringing 'uplifting, surprising, daring and intimate opera productions of the highest...

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Acerbic vision

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Michael Vestey T he melancholic wit and sharply observed prejudices of Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin enlivened the Afternoon Play spot on Radio Four last week in Dear Philip,...

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Possessed by demons

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James Delingpole A eister Crowley was expelled from my school for crucifying his housemaster's cat on the chapel altar. That was the popular rumour, anyway, and I can...

Talent spotting

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Robin Oakley W hen he first left school and joined David Nicholson's yard, the Duke's team all called Robert Thornton 'Chocolate'. The label was attached by Gordon Clarkson,...

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Steer clear of idiots

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Taki 0 Rougemont K sports fans, what do General William Tecumseh Sherman and Sir Jocelyn Stevens have in common? I warn you, it's a tricky one. General Sherman was the first...

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Thou shalt not . . .

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Petronella Wyatt A friend of mine was reading Anna Karenina recently and remarked that it was one of the great books on adultery as committed by a respectable female. We then...

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Simon Hoggart

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AN apology. Last month's offer, from Lay and Wheeler, was so popular and so greatly oversubscribed that poor Hugo Rose had to spend ages locating fresh stocks. Some readers had...

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Subject to non-availability

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Rachel Johnson THE latest issue, weighing in at one pound, was delivered through my door on Monday and had as many pages as the telephone directory for the Taunton and...

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Last to first

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Simon Barnes IT is not a time that will get many chapters in my autobiography. but I was one of the founding fathers of the Greyhound Star newspaper. During this brief period —...

Q. I recently suffered the embarrassment of being taken by

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a potential employer to lunch at a sushi bar. Boldly accepting the challenge of chopsticks, I found devouring the delicacy with any kind of grace impossible. It was a choice...

Q. My parents have bought me a flat to live

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in while I am at university, and this term I have invited in two fellow students to help with the mortgage. My problem is that while these two friends are perfect in every way,...

Q. Does one eat or drink soup? WM., RG19 A. A gentleman avoids using either term. He simply has it.

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Mary Killen