New York Letter #44

Paris Hilton at the Designer of The Year awards..and with brother Barron & Nicky Rothschild

 Some snaps from Whisper's resident New York City spy the ubiquitous social snapper Patrick McMullan. 
It's just a hint of the Big Apple's social scene and golly, there isn't a newsreader or footballer to be spotted.
left : Richard Gere at the Carnegie Hall 125th Anniversary dinner 
right : Henry Kissinger at the Carnegie Hall dinner

Donald Trump's ex Ivana Trump with Karl Wellner & Larry Kaiser at the Designer of the Year awards

singer Neil Sedaka (you remember him: mega hits) & wife Leba at the Designer of The Year wards.

Meanwhile Downtown at the Lucky Bee Restaurant in Soho owned by Aussies Rupert Noffs & Matty Bee, writer Sir Salman Rushdie paid a visit for dinner- pictured here with Noffs

"Invasion Of The Super Yachts"

The UK's Daily Mail has published a  feature on the many fabulous gin palaces that have invaded the Thames & London for the Olympics. It's deja vu time and just like a re-run of the Sydney 2000 Olympics when basically the same boats arrived in Sydney and lined up at the wharf in Blackwattle Bay, the only place large enough to host a billion dollars worth of luxury boating.

Hopefully those flogging luxury goods in London will not make the same mistake as several did at Blackwattle and set up stores nearby. A 3 star restaurant opened hoping to cater to yacht owners and several luxury goods purveyors like the South Australian Pearl jeweler who flew in a million dollars worth of gems and built a small boutique from the ground up for the  2 weeks of games. All went broke after the fortnight. Most of the boat owners flew in and stayed at hotels while the only people onboard their boats were staff.

Illona at Canary Wharf

the Murdochs at the Lowy dinner

Frank Lowy

One luxury ship in London is Frank Lowy's  Ilona that is moored at Canary Wharf, not far from his good friend Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.HQ. Lowy owns the giant Westfield Shopping Centres. Rupert & Wendi Murdoch flew to Sydney from New York in 2008 to attend a dinner in honour of Lowy at the Royal Randwick Racecourse as the Shuttle's exclusive pic shows.

Lowy fled Czechoslavakia to France in 1946 but was arrested by British troops and incarcerated at a detention camp in Cyprus, eventually making it to Israel and joining the Haganah. He arrived in Australia in 1953 and partnered with Hungarian immigrant John Saunders to create Westfield, now the largest shopping centre owners in the world. The Shuttle attended a breakfast at the Regent Hotel in Sydney for Henry Kissinger (see pic below with Ros Packer) in 1998. When Kissinger left the stage he was mobbed by the many politicians there but brushed them aside, making his way to Lowy's table where the 2 remained in deep conversation.

John Pilger describes the new film "Balibo" as a"travesty of omissions"

Writing exclusively for the City Hub, journalist John Pilger has questioned the truth as depicted in
the film Balibo which shows the lead-up and eventual deaths of six journalists by Indonesian troops during the 1975 Indonesian invasion of East Timor.

From an original script by respected playwright David Williamson, the story was eventually pared down to whitewash Australia's active involvement along with the USA and the CIA invasion of East Timor to obtain the great wealth of oil that lies beneath the Timor Sea.

He has scathing words for then ambassador to Indonesia Richard Woolcott who was at one in thinking with Henry Kissinger on "taking a pragmatic approach rather than a principled one" to get their hands on the tiny nation's wealth.

Balibo which stars Anthony LaPagli ignores the fact Australian intelligence sources had already intercepted Indonesian army commands that "no witnesses should be left alive" referring to the foreign media. They failed to warn the journalists of their imminent deaths.

Even worse. as Pilger says. Austalia's debt to the East Timorese who helped save Australia from the Japanese invasion in WW2 has never been fully repaid.

Pilger describes the Indonesian dictator Suharto as responsible for more atrocities than Pol Pot and recalls how Rupert Murdoch's newspaper "The Australian" constantly kowtowed to Suharto at the time.

During the 1991 infamous Dili Massacre when thousands of Timorese were slaughtered by Indonesian backed militias. the PM John Howard prevaricated for nearly 2 weeks before responding to Timorese pleas and an outraged Australian public, to send in peace-keeping troops.

read the City Hub here

For the true history of the monster Suhurto : Pilgers  film "Death Of A Nation: DVD is available from ; dennis@DVI.com.au